


Son of the Dawn

by cocoa_the_maniac



Category: Fargo (2014)
Genre: Assassins & Hitmen, Kidnapping, M/M, Manipulation, Mild Language, Minor Character Death, Rape/Non-con Elements, Spoilers, Stockholm Syndrome, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Threats of Violence, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-22
Updated: 2014-07-14
Packaged: 2018-01-26 04:26:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 22,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1674668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cocoa_the_maniac/pseuds/cocoa_the_maniac
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Having been released from the hospital, Lester wholly intends to make an honest effort to turn what's left of his life in the right direction. That is, of course, until a certain hitman for hire darkens his doorway once more, keen on seeing that Lester doesn't waste the opportunity he's given him to become something more than a simple insurance salesman.</p><p>Lester sees now what he should have seen the night he first met the man:</p><p>Lorne Malvo is the devil.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Moore's Paradox

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't some silly attempt to romanticize the role Lorne plays in Lester Nygaard's life. From the moment Lester meets him, all the way through Lorne's bizzare vanishing trick in the basement, I've firmly believed that Mr. Malvo was the devil (maybe not "literally", but you have to admit that there's something terribly off about him...).
> 
> Now, I've obviously deviated from the intended plot and maybe made Lester a bit wiser in the beginning, but I wanted to explore Lorne through Lester's eyes and it's hard to do that when they haven't seen each other, face to face, since the first episode. Ergo, the change in plans. Additionally, the whole season hasn't played out yet, so please be warned that there will be new spoilers as the show progresses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EDIT: Special thanks to The_Silent_Writer for agreeing to wade through this mess and beta my work for me! You, my dear, are incredible!

“ _It's raining, but I don't believe that it is raining.” -_ Moore's paradox

 

There is a number scribbled on the corner of a crumpled pink post-it note in his jacket pocket. He's supposed to dial it when he's ready to have someone drop by to clean up the mess, but looking down at the pool of blood staining the hardwood floor he can't help but picture Vern Thurman still lying there, his dark, glossy eyes fixed on the ceiling. Thinking of him gets Lester thinking about Pearl's stone cold corpse in the basement, and then pretty soon he can think of nothing else at all.

Numbly, he pulls off his jacket and hangs it over the back of a kitchen chair. His gaze is transfixed on the blood, careful to avoid it as he moves toward the stairs. The sight of it sends a shiver down his spine; it takes all his strength not to physically flinch.

 _Vern didn't have to die_ , he thinks.

But then, neither did Pearl.

He's been down into the basement once already, to dispose of the hammer. He had grabbed a number of things then to take with him to Chaz's house, but there are a few nick-knacks he's still missing. A razor; better winter gloves; maybe a few more clothes. Nothing much really, but he feels drawn to this place like a moth to the flame, and now he's beginning to wonder if his conscience won't win out on him one of these days, march him right into the Bemidji Police Department and force the truth out from between his trembling lips.

The thought sends another chill down his spine. Maybe he will, but not yet. He's too much of a coward for that, his foray into the world of uxoricide a brief but chilling affair, one he isn't too keen on reliving in the courtroom anytime soon.

He enters his room almost tentatively. He's had a good, solid cry already over Pearl's things, but he still feels an odd medley of emotions bubbling up inside him.

He tries to swallow down the lump in his throat as he walks over to the closet, pushing aside one of his wife's shoe boxes stuffed with old birthday cards to reach for another suitcase. Just as his hand closes firmly around the handle, though, it throbs painfully in response, as though someone's driven a nail straight through the soft tissue between his index finger and thumb.

The case drops heavily to the floor at his feet. Instinctively, he ignores it in favour of grabbing his wrist and flexing his fingers, gingerly spreading them as far apart as he dare go.

Upon first waking in the hospital, he'd assumed he'd been struck by a stray pellet the night of the incident, but it's something of a mystery that no one thought to tend to it when he had been comatose.

Some small voice at the back of his mind wonders if he isn't just imagining it.

Frowning, he makes a mental note to pick some ointment up on his way over to his brother's house tonight. He doesn't see anything lodged in there, but it's an open wound and will likely continue to fester until he does something about it.

He flexes his hand again. The wound is dark and sunken—glossy almost. It hasn't begun to ooze yet, but it still hurts like the dickens.

Bending down, he lifts the suitcase up onto the bed with his good hand and pops open the latch. The whole thing is covered in a thin sheet of dust. The last time he and Pearl had gone away on vacation had been...oh, he doesn't know. Two years ago, maybe. It feels like ages.

Without thinking about it, his eyes drift to the photograph of his wife perched on his bedside table. In the faded Polaroid picture she is smiling without really smiling, lips pulled back from her perfectly straight teeth as she poses patiently for the camera. He realizes then, quite honestly, that he had loved her just as viciously as he had hated her.

 _And I still do_.

He licks his lips and throws open the lid on the case. What's done is done. No amount of brooding will ever bring her back.

He was never good at packing, so it takes him a while to figure out what to bring. He packs at least enough clothes for another week and a half and tosses in his shaving kit. His brother had lent him a handful of disposables, but he's already nicked himself twice with them on the left corner of his jaw.

He reaches up to scratch the newest cut. It itches more than anything. Small and irritating.

Just like everything else it seems lately.

He looks through everything else in the medicine cabinet behind the sink in their en suite, half-hoping to find some sort of anti-microbial cream tucked away behind Pearl's facial soaps. He's standing there, pushing all the bottles off to one side, when he hears a knock downstairs.

Almost immediately he thinks of Molly Solverson. He's startled by the thought of her showing up again so brazenly on his doorstep, but he can't claim to be all that surprised. Somehow he knew she would be back to hound him.

Not entirely certain what he should do, he freezes for a moment and simply listens. Solverson, if it is her, doesn't knock again. Perhaps— _hopefully—_ she doesn't know for certain if he is there. He had parked on the road, but he's been driving Pearl's car, his own having gone missing the night that he killed her. No doubt his mysterious benefactor had something to do with that.

Thinking of him leaves a sour taste in his mouth. If he had never said anything in the hospital that fateful night, if he had maybe taken a second to just say _no_ , he wouldn't be here right now, torn up over his own heinous acts and running blindly from the law...

His hand throbs again on a whim. He feels... _violated_ . The absence of a clear answer, after all, had not been a definitive _yes_ . As badly as he had wanted to hurt Sam Hess, having been stripped of his power to decide _how_ he was going to deal with the man leaves him feeling just as weak as when Sam had been taunting him in the street. In essence, he had simply traded one bully for another, albeit one who claimed to be on his side.

Shaking his head, Lester switches off the bathroom lights. Then he walks across the room and pulls all the curtains shut.

 _Time to close up shop_ , he thinks bitterly. _Now you see me, world. Now you don't._

When he leans over the bed to grab his suitcase, he contemplates Pearl's photo one last time. He doesn't know whether he should grab it or chuck it out the bedroom window, he's so conflicted over the sight of her. All the little jabs, never knowing whether he was doing her right or wrong—he doesn't understand why she had hated him so much, or why she had ever bothered to marry him in the first place for that matter. Certainly, she had had better offers.

He finds himself waffling somewhere between grief and guilt when he finally relents and grabs the picture, pulling the photo out from its sacred place behind the frame. Folding it in half, he stuffs it into his back pocket and, taking his suitcase in hand, heads back downstairs.

The stairs creak quietly beneath his feet, the pool of blood looming in the corner of his vision. There are paper cups and rubber gloves littering the floor around the scene of the crime, where the constabulary had hemmed and hawed over Vern's cooling corpse. Regardless of how he feels about Pearl, the guilt he feels over Vern's untimely demise is as clear as crystal. He'll never forgive himself for what he's done to the man or his wife. Or their unborn child...

“A little late for regret, don't you think?”

Lester is so completely caught off guard, he drops his suitcase and nearly trips over his own feet in his haste to distance himself from the dark figure seated at his kitchen table. The man, in return, smiles a small smile in mock sympathy.

“What are you doing here?” Lester asks on reflex, because he already knows how to answer that question. He knows well enough that he is the only witness to what happened the night this man came to clean up his mess, and witnesses don't make much in the way of conversation when they themselves are dead.

“I don't often, but on occasion I've been known to make an investment,” Malvo explains. Between his gloved fingers he's holding Lester's mail, going through all the fliers one by one until, seemingly satisfied, he deposits them on the table. “Now, I'm here to collect.” A pause; another small smile. “ _Lester_.”

In the back of his mind, Lester is wondering if he can make it to the front door before the man can get to him, but then his eyes catch the glint of the knife on the table beside Malvo's elbow and he knows that this is as good a warning as he'll ever get. Gathering his wits about him, he asks, “And what is it that you want?”

“Exactly what I paid. With interest.” Malvo rises slowly to his feet and nods once at the suitcase. “Pick that up.”

Cautiously, Lester reaches down to retrieve it, keeping his eyes on the man as he paces closer. Apparently in no hurry, Malvo takes one slow step after another until he's standing directly in front of Lester, cold, dark eyes appraising him from head to toe.

Malvo doesn't say a word, doesn't even _move,_ but Lester's nerves are so completely fried, he almost drops the case again as he's straightening back up. His guest looks undeniably amused by Lester's distress, and suddenly Lester can't remember whether or not he left the knife on the kitchen table. Would he kill him here, right where he killed Vern Thurman? Or would he ask for money first, perhaps dangle the possibility of hope in front of Lester's eyes before snuffing it out?

Dark spots dance across his vision, and suddenly he realizes he's been holding his breath. He's so nervous, he doesn't even realize Malvo is reaching for his injured hand until he's leaned close enough that Lester can feel his breath on his face. Startled, Lester twists his torso away from him, holding his hand far back and away from his reach, only to realize that Malvo is, instead, making a grab for Pearl's photograph.

Plucking it smoothly from his pocket, Malvo takes a steps back. Unfolding it, he gives it a brief once over. “...I was wondering what she looked like.”

 _Before I bludgeoned her to death, you mean_ , Lester thinks, because after the first swing it had been far too easy to take another, and Malvo had only seen her after the deed had been done. All that blood. _God_ , all that _blood..._

“Please...” Lester says quietly, but he doesn't know what he's asking for. The picture, perhaps, but Malvo is already refolding it and tucking away it into his own jacket pocket

“You've been in limbo these last few days,” Malvo says. He scrunches his nose up a little, like a doctor's who's seen the same stupid symptoms in a single population crop up for a number of years already and can't figure out why he hasn't been able to eradicate this goddamn plague. “It's all kind of ' _hazy_ '?”

“Yes,” he replies, gaze dropping to the floor.

“Say hello to the human conscience.”

“I don't need—“

“But I think you do,” Malvo cuts in sharply. Startled, Lester lifts his gaze to his face. “Let's not get confused here, Lester. I know _exactly_ what you're thinking. You're thinking of her, on the floor, and you're thinking of _you_ , leaning over her. You're _killing_ _her,_ but you don't _believe_ that you're a killer... Don't you understand how absurd that is?”

Lester swallows, hard. He knows what Malvo is saying here. He's _hearing_ him, but there's a part of him that still wants to deny it. Deny the fact that, no matter how much he might claim to have loved his wife, over the years he had come to hate her just a little bit more.

He doesn't want to believe that he is a horrible person.

Nor does he understand what sort of sick satisfaction Malvo gets from telling him that he is.

“Why does it matter to you?” Lester asks, feeling a little weary. The short boost of adrenaline he initially got at the sight of Malvo sitting in his kitchen has dwindled by now, leaving him feeling sluggish and weak.

“A whole lot. Like I said before, I made an investment.” Malvo looks down then at the dried blood by his feet. “Sooner or later, the police are going to trace your calls from the night of the murder, and one of them will lead to my motel room. They already know that we had a little chat at the hospital about Sam Hess, so unless you want them to figure things out, I suggest you listen carefully.”

“You're not an altruistic man,” Lester replies softly.

Malvo smiles again, but this time he looks genuinely pleased. It's a stupidly simple observation, yes, but Malvo can hear what Lester's really saying: _Nothing good ever comes from you or what you do._ _Not then; not now; not ever_.

Whatever reasons Malvo has for coming here—whatever _investment_ he thinks he might've made—Lester knows that he's probably better off dead than listening to another word this man has to say. He also knows it's quite probable that he _will_ end up dead before this conversation is over, or at least wishing he were dead, if nothing else at all.

“I like a challenge,” is all Malvo says, eyes now sweeping the room, calculating. “There's an easy way of doing this, Lester, and then there's the other way. Choose wisely.”

Instinctively, Lester flexes the fingers of his wounded hand. Blood pulsing, tissue inflamed, he can feel his rapid heartbeat in the palm of his hand.

He's five paces away from the door; he's five inches away from Lorne Malvo.

He makes his choice.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Seriously, guys, Malvo scares the hell out of me...*shivers*)


	2. The Horse, the Hunter, and the Stag

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: First off, you people are amazing! Thank you for all your incredible comments and kudos! I have it in my head to write this story and it's going to get written whether or not I get feedback on it, but I most certainly appreciate your input. Please also feel free to let me know if you have any concerns. I've put all the warnings I can think of in the tags, but if you ever feel that I'm missing something just let me know.
> 
> Now, I'm not entirely sure how well Lorne's time-line matches up with Lester's in the show, but I've taken the plot from just before Lester meets Mr. Numbers and Mr. Wrench. I should have mentioned that before, and for that I apologize. I'll be using other elements that pop up later in the show though, so consider yourselves warned—here there be spoilers...
> 
> CHAPTER WARNING: Flashbacks to the death of an animal (all other warnings still apply).
> 
> EDIT: Special thanks to The_Silent_Writer for agreeing to wade through this mess and beta my work for me! You, my dear, are incredible!

When Lester was six years old, his father had been employed as a farm hand for a gentleman who raised dairy cattle. As a child, Lester had never had any interest in farms or the assorted animals that supposedly lived there like some of his fellow classmates, but on the long summer weekends that his mother drove over to visit his dying grandmother in Marquette, Wisconsin, his father would slip him into his yellow rubber boots before the first light of dawn and stuff his groggy son into the back seat of his pick-up truck before heading off to work.

Nothing spectacular ever really happened to Lester there, but at least he was free to roam the fields as he pleased. If it rained, Lester would often muck about all day in the puddles until his father chased him out of the water; if it didn't rain, he usually retreated into the shade of the trees or explored the barns in a last ditch attempt to escape the heat.

There were really only three rules set out for him at the farm: don't bother anyone who was working, don't go anywhere near the machinery, and try not to bother the cattle. He was not much of a troublemaker, and so he was, more or less, content to lean against the barn wall and watch the cattle chew their cud, staring bug-eyed at him from behind their feeding bins.

A person could almost argue that Lester had had a fine, if uneventful, time at that farm, although he's sure they'd beg to differ if they knew about the stainless steel door and the horrors it concealed.

He didn't know it back then, but the farm had doubled as a research facility during the summer months. Of the newborn calves born there, only the heifers, the females, were ever kept and raised to become dairy cattle themselves, while the bull calves were slaughtered sometime in the first few weeks of their lives for veal. Alternatively though, college students studying agriculture or animal sciences could make use of the bull calves themselves, free of charge, granted that they collected what they needed from the animals within 72 hours of their birth.

The steel door that often plagued Lester's nightmares nowadays had been located at the far end of the largest barn. Hanging over it had been a sign that read in large, red letters: _Surgical Room – Staff and Students ONLY._ Never having any real desire to break the rules, Lester was perfectly content to ignore the door completely, although this had been a point in his life where he had only just begun to learn how to read and he rarely, if ever, paid any attention whatsoever to signs situated nearly five feet above his head.

One blistering hot day, half dazed with heat stroke, Lester had retreated inside the barn to discover that the steel door had been propped open. He had hesitated upon seeing it at first, uncertain as to why the foreboding door was no longer locked shut, but the cool air blowing out from the brightly lit room on the other side was more than enough to lure him inside, his feet carrying him through the threshold before he could really stop to think about the what it was exactly he was doing.

The mysterious room had been unremarkable really. It was small, lined with wooden shelves and stainless steel counters, with a refrigerator in one corner and a trolly parked in the very centre. The trolly itself was packed with plastic wrapped scalpels and scissors, metal trays, labeled bags, and several small jugs filled with clear solution. It smelt strongly of disinfectant, but beneath it all he could still detect the sickly sweet odour of cow feed and something oddly metallic that he couldn't quite put his finger on.

Another door was located on the opposite side of the small room and it too was propped open. It led to a much larger area containing the pens and machinery required to deal with injured animals. Currently, it was occupied by a tall, blond woman, two young men, two farm hands and a newborn bull calf. The woman and the young men were wearing white lab coats and latex gloves, chatting among themselves quietly about the 'duodenum'. The farm hands Lester recognized as his father and one of the older fellows, Jet, both of which appeared to be manoeuvring the calf to lie over a large metal floor grill.

“How long do you have?” his father had asked, keeping his eyes trained on the struggling animal.

“Ideally, we'd like to get everything bagged in the next thirty minutes,” the woman replied. “How long do you need?”

“About ten.”

Lester had moved to one side of the door so that he was partially hidden behind the wall. Deep in his gut he knew something was terribly wrong, but whether it be out of morbid fascination or pity, he found that he couldn't tear his eyes away from the calf. The small animal didn't make much noise and actually seemed quite calm after it had settled itself on the ground—but then, what would a newborn calf know of its impending doom?

The woman reached over to grab a long, dark cylinder from a second trolley beside her and handed this over to his father. One of the young men handed Jet some rope. Together, they braced the calf's head as his father pressed one end of the cylinder against its forehead.

With a resounding ' _bang_!', the calf jerked viciously once and dropped its head, dazed, to the ground.

Much later, Lester would realize that his father had used a captive bolt pistol to stun the animal. At the time, however, he had been first alarmed and then suddenly confused by the lack of blood, although he knows now that the pistol had functioned without bullets. The true method of slaughter, and the image that would forever be engrained in his memories, was the sight of his father trading the bolt gun with the woman for a knife, kneeling quietly before the twitching animal, and then effortlessly slitting its throat.

Lester had nearly fainted right then and there. When he thinks back on it now, he's not sure how he managed to stumble out of the surgery room unnoticed, almost colliding with the trolley in his haste to get away. He remembers running back out into the fields and climbing the nearest tree, hiding among the leaves until his father came out to collect him, ignoring the other farm hands who had tried to kindly coax him down earlier with a glass of cold water and some sweets.

He never did tell his father what he had seen that day, afraid that he would somehow be reprimanded for going where he wasn't supposed to, but he assumes now that his father had figured it out when Lester outright refused to return to the farm with him the following week. For the next two and a half months that summer, Lester instead rode in the stuffy old Cadillac with his mother to visit his grandmother in Wisconsin until the old woman succumbed to her pneumonia, oxygen machine wheezing rhythmically on beside her.

Chaz was born a year later and grew up to be the perfect son, playing every manner of sport and getting into the worst kind of boyish trouble just to make the old man proud. Lester instead grew a little distant, although his father seemingly respected his new found introversion, even though he never did approve of Lester's crippling fear of blood.

And crippling was about as apt a word as he could use to describe it. The sight of a paper cut alone was often enough to make him feel woozy, although he had managed over the years to learn how to refrain from vomiting. In fact, it wasn't until the first spray of blood from his wife's battered head that it had ever managed to make him feel anything more than foolish and faint.

It had made him feel alive.

Reminiscing on it _now_ only makes him feel sick, although more so his actions than the actual mess he made on the basement floor. He's well over his fear of blood now, whether he likes it or not, though that's not to say something more terrifying in his life hasn't managed to take its place.

Lester is not a brave man, having been cursed with an inclination to avoid all conflict, and so he is almost always the least likely person to toe the line. Having said that, this instinct had failed him once before when he murdered his wife and was about to fail him yet again when he decided that the right course of action in a situation like this, standing in his living room between the devil and a dry pool of blood, was to knee Lorne Malvo.

He knows, deep down inside, that there's no way he's going to beat the guy. When Malvo looks him in the eye, Lester imagines the man must see a small, frightened animal trying frantically to gnaw it's leg off to escape a gleaming snare. That's exactly what Lester thinks anyway when his raises his knee, because Malvo doesn't look all that surprised as he shifts his weight back smoothly, taking the cheap hit to the inside of his thigh instead of directly to his groin. Almost immediately, Malvo makes a grab for his shirt collar, but by then Lester is swinging the suitcase at him, simultaneously spinning away and out of reach of the man toward the door. He feels the suitcase connect with his intended target and is satisfied by the pained grunt he hears behind him, but he's not foolish enough to stop and check, simply releasing the handle as he runs.

He doesn't know how close behind him Malvo is and he has no desire to know, so he more or less barrels his way out the door and nearly slips on a patch of ice in his mad scramble across the lawn to his car. Once he hits the sidewalk though, he realizes that the keys to said car are in his coat pocket back in the kitchen, and this causes him to slow, one hand braced against the side of his wife's vehicle to steady himself as he wonders frantically what the hell he's going to do now.

He doesn't wonder for long before something connects with the back of his head. Lester takes a small step forward before he falls, landing gracelessly in a pile of newly shovelled snow. He tries to blink away the spots of light dancing across his vision, but all he manages to see is the dark silhouette of a man kneeling over him and the clear blue sky above. Faintly though, he can make out the face of Lorne Malvo.

And he is smiling.

~*~

Lester has had a great deal of experience with concussions.

Sam Hess had done a number on him in his youth, enough so that he had been wheeled into the emergency room completely comatose _twice_ before his sixteenth birthday. Given though that he knows the damage done by each concussion is typically worse than the last, he has absolutely no idea how long he's been out cold when he wakes up stuffed inside his wife's trunk.

Her bag of knitting things is digging into his lower back and he's pretty sure he's lying on her tire iron, but at least the car's emergency blanket has been draped over his body to help with the chill. He shifts a little then to see if he truly _is_ lying in his wife's trunk but regrets it almost immediately. His head feels as though it's been completely crushed and then pieced back together again with crazy glue. There's also a faint ringing in his ears and he feels like he's about to be sick, although he knows that these symptoms will fade with time, granted that the driver quit hitting every bump in the road.

For a while, Lester simply lies there and tries not to think. His wrists are tied behind his back with what feels like plastic ties and his hands feel a bit numb, but he doesn't care. He can't remember what's happened to him or why he's been stuffed into his _wife's_ trunk of all places, and he's hoping, maybe, that he's managed to hit his head hard enough to hallucinate his own kidnapping.

Slowly, then, it comes to him.

 _I killed Pearl_.

Her vacant stare is the first thing that comes to mind, followed by the lazy trail of blood trickling slowly down her forehead as she collapses back onto the basement floor. He remembers then that he is a murderer and that the only thing that saved him from getting arrested that night was a dusty shotgun and the dark figure wielding it.

Lester feels another wave of nausea wash over him. He still doesn't remember the events leading up to his kidnapping, but at least he has an inkling of why he feels like he's about to meet his maker.

The car slows suddenly and turns left. Lester's body shifts with the motion, stomach roiling. He closes his mouth and swallows hard, breathing evenly through his nose. _One step at a time_ , he thinks. If he can manage not to choke to death on his own vomit, he'll consider it a success.

When he's convinced he isn't about to hurl his last meal, he tests the bindings on his wrists again. Not that he thinks he can wriggle his way out of them, but at least he has enough sensation left in his fingers to still use them.

Taking hold of what he can of his wife's knitting kit, he manoeuvres the bag as best he can until he finds the zipper, tugging it down far enough to slip his hands inside. It takes him a while, but eventually he's able to find the small scissors stuffed into one of the inside pockets. He doesn't know if he can cut the plastic ties with them, but as he feels the vehicle slowing to a halt, he realizes that he can still make use of them somehow later on, stuffing them instead into one of his back pockets.

When the driver kills the engine, he feels his heart leap up into his throat and flinches when the car door swings open and then slams shut. He doesn't remember who put him here, but in his mind's eye he envisions a familiar man and his cruel, smiling face as he chats calmly about the Red Tide and a world without boundaries. It's the same face he sees when the trunk door is finally lifted, the sky black and starless behind him.

It is the Devil's face.

Malvo takes him by his elbow and pulls him up. Lester's vision swims suddenly and he knows instantly that there's no possible way he can stand on his own two feet without blacking out again completely.

He hears Malvo give a long suffering sigh before Lester is being manoeuvred and lifted, head throbbing painfully as he's hoisted over the man's shoulder. He's feels like he's going to vomit again, but he somehow can't, and that ironically makes him feel more miserable than the imaginary hammer pummelling his head.

It's too dark outside to see much of anything and his world is inverted, but to the left he can make out a large building—a mansion, perhaps—brightly illuminated and surrounded by motion sensitive spotlights; to the right, he sees nothing but fir trees. From what he can tell, there isn't anybody else outside, and he imagines that this is why Malvo chose this location, somewhere he can do away with Lester without having to keep an eye out for witnesses.

They're not heading off into the forest though, which is why Lester is surprised when he hears Malvo fiddling with a set of keys. Instead, he's taken inside what appears to be a small living room dimly lit by a single lamp before being deposited unceremoniously on a sofa.

“ _Jeez_ ,” he mutters, closing his eyes. This is it. If anybody moves him again, his skull is going to shatter.

He hears Malvo moving around the room, closing the front door, probably taking off his jacket, tossing his key ring onto the coffee table. He can also hear the man moving toward him, but he refuses to open his eyes until Malvo gives a hard nudge to his shoulder.

“Stay awake,” he commands.

Lester blinks. He doesn't know if he _can_ stay awake. “Where am I?”

“Near Duluth.” Malvo straightens up and disappears into an adjoining room. The lights flicker on inside and Lester hears a tap suddenly running water.

He closes his eyes again, just because the light is bothering him, until Malvo quietly returns and slaps his foot. “What did I just say?”

Lester jerks awake, squinting his eyes. “Hit the light, would you?”

Malvo reaches through the doorway and shuts it off, coffee machine percolating softly in the background. Then he tilts his head to one side, appraising him, and asks “You all there, Lester?”

“...Why am I in Duluth?”

“Because there's work to be done in Duluth,” Malvo replies, pulling up a chair. “Now, do I have your full attention, or are you going to do something stupid again?”

“I'm not moving,” he mumbles, and it's the honest truth.

“Good, because we have a long discussion ahead of us.” Leaning back in his chair, Malvo glances at the living room window. The curtains are shut, but the light from the spotlights still shine on through. “What have you told the police?”

Lester tries to relax. He's well within hitting distance of the man, but he feels that Malvo wants this conversation to go as smoothly as he does, so he figures that the best course of action at the moment is to answer Malvo's questions as honestly as he can. “Nothing. I have amnesia.” He swallows hard, trying to remember what exactly he said. It's foggy, but he can still make out bits and pieces of it. “When the other police showed up that night, I concussed myself against the wall.”

Malvo smiles hard enough to show his perfectly white teeth. “You have an odd fetish for head injuries, friend.”

“They thought it was a home invasion,” he continues. “They think I don't know anything.”

“ _All_ of them?” Malvo asks evenly.

“Well, yes...no.” His mouth feels dry. He knows he wouldn't be able to keep anything down, but there is suddenly nothing he wants more at the moment than a glass of water. “There's one. Sergeant Solverson. She thinks I know more than I'm telling.”

Malvo's eyes are glossy and dark in the dim light. Like a shark's. Malvo doesn't move so much as a muscle from his relaxed position in the chair, but Lester can almost feel the tension coiling inside the man, as though he's already thinking about how he's going to kill the woman. “She the only one?”

“That I'm aware of, yeah. The Chief doesn't believe her. He and I are old friends.”

“There's a cop in Duluth. He's got bigger priorities though.”

“There will be more when they realize I'm gone.”

“Suspected kidnapping. I'll let you know the details later.” Malvo shifts in his seat, crossing his legs. “I hope you don't mind, but I made one hell of a mess back at your place.”

Lester still doesn't remember the events leading up to his most recent concussion, but he figures either they had one hell of a scuffle back at his place or Malvo at least made it out to look that way. Whatever the case may be, there's no mystery what the police are going to think of him now. “It's going to look like I ran. That I'm _guilty.”_

“Not if you trust me,” Malvo replies. “So just shut up and trust me. Have I ever let you down before?”

“ _Have_ you? _”_ Lester says, voice catching in the back of his throat. “I didn't ask you to kill Sam Hess. I never said ' _yes'._ ”

“But the way you looked at me was just _asking_ for it,” Malvo leers. “Don't act like you didn't want it, Lester. I know blood lust when I see it. It was splattered all over your basement floor.”

Lester looks away from him, up at the ceiling. After a long pause, he asks, “What do you want from me? I don't make enough in a year to afford an hour of your time.”

“Money comes and money goes. What the hell do I want money for?” The light suddenly goes off outside. Lester shudders. “Every man is a gun, Lester, utterly useless until it's loaded. I like to keep mine loaded.”

“...You want me to do something for you?”

“I killed two people for you, Lester. It's only polite if you returned the favour.”

“Who could you _possibly_ want me to kill?"

Malvo is eerily quiet for a moment. Lester cranes his head to look at him again, locking his gaze on Malvo's dark, dead eyes. It's the same look Malvo had when he offered to kill Sam Hess, like destiny was already unfolding and there was nothing Lester could do to change it.

Softly, Malvo replies, “I haven't decided yet.”

 

~*~

_There came a time when the friendship between the Horse and the Stag had been broken by a terrible quarrel. Wounded as he was by the Stag's misdeeds and seeking revenge, the Horse came to the Hunter to ask for his help. The Hunter, of course, was more than willing to aid the Horse, but only on the condition that the Horse did exactly as he was told: he was to hold a piece of iron between his teeth so that the Hunter could guide him with the reins and he was to wear a saddle on his back so that the Hunter could keep him steady as they pursued the enemy._

_Without hesitation, the Horse agreed. Saddled and bridled and led by the hand of the Hunter, the Stag could not outrun or outwit the Horse and was eventually slain. Victorious, the Horse then asked the Hunter to dismount and remove his gear. Laughing, the Hunter replied: “I have now got you under bit and spur, and prefer to keep you as you are at present.”_

_It was then, with dawning horror, that the Horse finally understood: If you allow men to use you for your own purposes, there is nothing to stop them from using you for theirs._

_\- (re-summarized) Aesop's fable, “The Horse, Hunter, and Stag”_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: I know it's another incredibly short chapter, so I apologize. Expect longer chapters in the future.
> 
> PS: The most time I spend on writing this story is actually invested in hunting down relevant fables/paradoxes/what-have-yours, so if there's any creepy ones you're aware of, please let me know.
> 
> PPS: I hail from Canada, so I'm sorry if my spelling is a bit off.


	3. The Man and the Wooden Idol

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because, naturally, after a while of reading and rereading the chapters to this story, I gradually lose the ability to see my many mistakes, I've been letting things sit for a while before going back to edit what's already been posted. Nothing big of course--just grammar mistakes really, but if you see anything that's annoying you and hasn't been changed yet, please don't hesitate to ever let me know.
> 
> Anyhow, on with the story!
> 
> EDIT: Special thanks to The_Silent_Writer for agreeing to wade through this mess and beta my work for me! You, my dear, are incredible!

Lester doesn't say anything when Malvo informs him that the price for his services is the death of a yet unnamed individual somewhere in the sleepy county of Duluth. What Malvo has to gain from forcing Lester to take another life is beyond his understanding, although he is beginning to see that perhaps Lorne Malvo is not a man capable of being completely understood.

What little Lester _does_ understand of the man, is this: Lorne Malvo is anarchy personified. He is hatred and vengeance and all the dark, malicious deeds once executed only in the dead of the night. He doesn't need a reason to make a person miserable, and he has no real interest in material gains, but Lester also knows that _nobody_ acts in the complete absence of a reward. Everybody has something that they desperately want, even a wicked man like Malvo.

It is for this reason that Lester doesn't completely begin to hyperventilate when Malvo tells him the facts as they currently stand. Malvo might want him to pull the trigger on someone else, but there will have to be a decent reason as to why he would want to have that person dead in the first place. If Lester can determine _why_ , perhaps he can then figure out another way around it.

This doesn't make their conversation any less horrifying though, so Lester continues to lie there and stare at Malvo in stunned silence until there is a sudden, shrill noise in the kitchen from the coffee machine. Lester noticeably flinches at the sound.

Malvo glances down at his wristwatch with a sigh before rising to his feet. Reaching behind him, he pulls out a pocket knife. “Roll onto to your side.”

Gingerly, Lester turns over until he's facing the back of the sofa. Malvo leans down to cut the ties with a single swipe, and then all the blood goes rushing back into Lester's hands. He flexes his fingers to ease the familiar pins-and-needles sensation, but grimaces once feeling returns to his festering wound.

Malvo grabs him unexpectedly by the wrist and lifts his hand to inspect the injury. He's still holding the knife though, and suddenly Lester gets the mental image of the man pulling off the gauze and digging his blade into the purulent mess to pop out the bullet.

He jerks his hand back impulsively, but Malvo's grip merely tightens.

“We'll deal with this later,” the man mutters. “Unless you _want_ it to go septic?”

“It's from the buckshot. The police found me passed out in the basement; Vern was shot on the main floor. What was I supposed to do?”

Malvo says nothing. Instead he retreats into the darkened kitchen to pour his coffee.

Slowly, Lester sits up, glancing briefly at the keys on the table. They're not his car keys, but even if they were, he's not entirely sure he would want to make a grab for them now. He already knows that Malvo can beat him in a mad dash. He'll have to put an honest effort into crafting a better escape plan this time.

Malvo returns with a cup of coffee in one hand and a half-filled glass of water in the other, both of which he sets downs on the small table before reaching for a pill bottle tucked under his arm. This he tosses to Lester. “Take two. Sip the water. You'll eat when you can promise me you won't vomit.”

Lester pops the pills into his mouth and has some of the water. The motion sensitive lights outside flash back on again, so Malvo takes up his coffee cup and stands by the window, staring out through the crack in the curtains.

Lester gives the living room a quick once over. It's a simple but elegant set up, just your standard living room furniture with a small television set and an old CD player in one corner. There are paintings on the wall, but no personal pictures or family portraits. “Is this...is this a guest house?”

“Client is paranoid. Usually doesn't let anyone sleep overnight in the house.”

That explains the chill at least.

Lester wants to ask more about this anonymous client, but only enough to figure out where exactly Malvo's taken him to in Duluth. He assumes that the less he knows about Malvo's work, the longer he might have before the man finds an appropriate target for him to kill. As such, he figures that right about now is the perfect time to end their conversation.

Malvo turns then as if on cue to give him a disappointed look. “You can take a swing at me whenever the hell you want, I don't care, you know how badly that'll end anyway, but don't lie to me or try to play dumb.”

“I don't...I'm not...”

“My client is Stavros Milos, owner of Phoenix Farms.” Malvo sips his coffee and stares back out the window. “Every human being has a burning question, Lester...Ask.”

Tentatively, Lester says, “...Why has he hired you?”

“He wants me to track down his blackmailer.”

“Are you close to finding him?”

“I've already found him.”

Oh, heck. The poor bastard... “You're going to deal with him now?”

“Already dealt with him too.”

Lester shifts uncomfortably in his seat. He's hoping there isn't a body stuffed somewhere in one of the closets here. “Have you told Mr. Milos yet?”

“Not as such, no.” Malvo frowns. “But I don't think any of those were the question you really wanted to ask me.”

Lester drinks a little more water. His mouth is suddenly drier than ever before. “I...where in or around Duluth am I?”

“Far enough from civilization that you'd freeze to death if you decided to take an evening stroll.” Malvo returns from his post at the window, setting his cup down on the coffee table. “I also wouldn't recommend bothering Starvos. Given the stress he's been under lately, I doubt he'd take kindly to a stranger showing up out of nowhere on his private property.”

“I'm not going to run.”

Malvo smiles, as though Lester is deliberately trying to be funny. “Oh, I know.”

Without another word, Malvo disappears back into the kitchen and returns shortly with a small suitcase. He opens it on the coffee table long enough for Lester to catch a glimpse of it's black, foamy interior and the cassette tapes nestled safely inside before Malvo selects one and closes the case again. Lester realizes his full name is printed along the side.

Suddenly he feels cold.

Malvo drops the tape into the CD player in the corner, rewinding it a bit before hitting _'play'_ :

_“Yeah?”_

                   “ _Yeah. Yeah it—it's me. It's Lester. Uh...she's uh—my wi—my wife, she's, uh...Oh, hell um... Look. I think I, uh...she's in the basement dead and, uh, look, I'm freaking out here. I_ _don't know what to do.”_

_“ ...Lester, have you been a bad boy?”_

                  “ _Ha—”He chokes on a sob._ _“Jeez...Yeah....The hammer and, uh—”_

Malvo presses _'stop'_. “Need I go on?”

Lester can't speak. Numbly, he shakes his head.

Malvo hits _'eject'_ and pops the tape out. This he holds out to Lester, “Want it? I've got another copy.”

He shakes his head again.

“Then I think this speaks for itself.” Malvo returns the tape to his suitcase. “If you run, or if you do anything as equally stupid, this is going to be every radio station's hottest new number. From this point on, you're going to do everything I tell you, without question... Nod if you understand.”

Lester's gaze drops to the floor. He nods.

“Good. Follow me.”

Between the lack of blood flow to his extremities and the quivering in his gut, Lester doesn't know if he has the energy to move, but somehow he manages to will himself up onto his feet. He follows after Malvo through the kitchen to the bedroom at the back of the house, stepping inside past Malvo.

“Get some rest. We'll deal with your hand in the morning.” Lester moves to grab the doorknob but Malvo gestures him away toward the bed. “Leave the door open.”

Lester's about to tell the man that he's not the type to kill himself on a whim, but he doesn't want to be seen as stepping out of line this early in the game. Besides, he wonders how many other men or women Malvo has done this to, and how many of them eventually let their minds wander. Maybe, after he's had enough time to let this all sink in, he'll be tempted himself.

Malvo returns to the living room. Lester hears the high-pitch whine of static as the television set is turned on and immediately muted, then the rustling of papers.

He slips out of his boots and drops them out of the way beside the door. Then he crawls under the covers of the double bed and closes his eyes.

Succumbing to his lethargy and the incessant pounding of his head, he drifts fitfully off to sleep.

~*~

He wakes late enough in the morning that there's sunlight streaming in through the crack in the curtains, having been roused by the slamming of the front door and the sound of someone stomping the snow out of their boots. He lifts a hand to rub the crud from his eyes, turning slowly unto his back when he's certain his skull still isn't about to split in half. It still hurts like the dickens, but at least his mind is clear enough that he can remember that he's currently somewhere in Duluth and at the mercy of a complete psychopath.

Either Malvo assumes he's still asleep or he's got better things to do than wake Lester, because Lester is able to lie in peace for the next ten minutes or so as he tries to get his bearings. He knows the man isn't going to leave him alone indefinitely though, so he sits up slowly and gently flexes the fingers of his injured hand.

The bandages are bloody again. Malvo said he was going to get it checked out today, but Lester knows that it's going to take nothing less than surgery to remove the pellet properly and that that would require a trip to the nearest emergency clinic.

Unless, of course, Malvo means to remove it himself...

The thought sends a shiver down his spine, but he knows that if it isn't dealt with soon, the wound will, as Malvo indicated earlier, go septic.

He's interrupted from his thoughts when said man steps into the room. Malvo deposits Lester's suitcase by the door and nods his head in the direction of the bedroom's en suite. “Clean up. We leave in an hour.”

Lester hauls himself out of bed without question.

He takes a quick shower and shaves, drying his hair as best he can with a towel when he realizes that there's no blow dryer stored under the sink. Fortunately though there's some gauze rolled up in the medicine cabinet next to a tube of polysporin, so he gingerly re-wraps his swollen hand as best he can and tries not to wretch at the sight of pus oozing from the now-bloated wound.

He slips into his dress pants and a new shirt, checking to make sure he still has the scissors in his pocket, and then steps back into the bedroom to shuck on his boots. Once he's ready and out in the kitchen, Malvo tosses him a mushy, saran wrapped ham-&-cheese sandwich that he probably got from a gas station. At the sight of it though, Lester's stomach clenches longingly; he'd almost forgotten how hungry he was.

“Don't eat that until later,” Malvo interjects before Lester has a chance to unwrap it. “You'll need an empty stomach.”

Lester's a little miffed, but he doesn't bother to argue. He has a theory...“No water either, I take it?”

Malvo shakes his head, but hands Lester an unopened bottle. “No water either.”

He's about to get surgery then, it seems.

~*~

When Malvo had abducted Lester from his home, he not only grabbed his suitcase but also his winter gloves, hat, and jacket. Once Lester's decked up for the weather, Malvo leads him outside and around the house to where a Cadillac SUV is parked on the roundabout driveway. Pearl's car is nowhere in sight.

Glancing up at the mansion, Lester immediately catches sight of the security camera above the garage, seemingly focused directly on him. “Uh, so that bit about avoiding your client at all costs...?”

Without stopping to look back at him, Malvo pops open the SUV's trunk. “The camera's are on, but I've disabled the recordings for the time being. Nobody is home. Get in.”

Lester stares at the trunk for a moment.“... _Really_?”

“Yes. Remember the cop I mentioned earlier? This is his favourite fucking route.” Malvo turns around then, fixing him with his dead-eyed stare, “So it stands to reason that if I can see you through the rear-view mirror, someone else can probably see you through the windows, namely him. Now, climb in, lie down, and shut up.”

Lester can concede to that, but he's still baffled by the camera and how simple Malvo mentioned it was to disable it. _Some security_ , he thinks, giving the camera one last look before crawling into the trunk. Then again, if Malvo's client had been better equipped, he probably wouldn't have required the services of a professional gun for hire.

 _Then again_ , people rarely, if ever, prepare themselves for the absolute worst. They gauge how poorly their luck is on a daily basis and then adjust accordingly. After all, the crossing light on the northeast corner of Lester's high school wasn't installed until Lawrence Mayfair and his girlfriend got run over in the eleventh grade. It took _two_ lives to put up a blinking light...

Looking at it that way, Lester realizes that people really do set themselves up for disaster. In reality, Malvo doesn't have to put a whole lot of effort into ruining a person's life. All he has to do is ask, and they'll pretty much hand him all the ammo he needs.

Just like Lester.

Malvo waits until Lester's lying flat on his back before slamming the trunk door firmly shut. Lester doesn't have a watch, so he has no idea how long the trip takes, but it feels an awful lot like an hour. He's not saying that because he feels bored, but because his hand throbs painfully the whole ride over. At one point he slips his glove off to relieve the pressure, only to discover that he's bled all the way through the gauze again.

For the first time since he was shot, Lester's genuinely worried that he's about to lose his hand.

That horrible thought occupies his mind until the SUV suddenly slows before switching into reverse. Ten seconds later, Malvo kills the engine.

“Don't move,” Malvo says before climbing out. He's gone for about five minutes before he returns to open the trunk, revealing the alleyway entrance to some two-storey building and a middle-aged woman wearing a white lab coat.

The woman doesn't say anything, but the delicate arch of her left eyebrow tells all when she catches sight of Lester's hand.

“Well?” Malvo asks.

“My associate will be leaving soon. He's finishing off some paperwork.” Looking at Lester, she then says, “Bullet wound?”

“Just a pellet.”

“Same difference.” Sighing, she gestures him out of the trunk. She's a petite thing, almost a foot shorter than Lester, but she has a hard look about her that tells him he's not about to get any sympathy from her. “This will take a while. Come back after twelve.”

Malvo doesn't say anything. He gives Lester one last look before climbing back into the SUV—one that's loaded with ill tidings should Lester try anything 'stupid'.

“Nothing funny now, or I'll call the police,” the woman says, as though to reinforce that thought.

Lester nods solemnly and follows her into the building.

She leads him down a long hallway that smells strongly of disinfectant. When they reach the door at the end, she unlocks it and peeks inside before motioning for him to follow her in. It's a post-op room with three empty, hospital gurneys pushed up against one wall, separated by blueish-green plastic curtains. At the far end is a set of electronic doors which open when she approaches them to reveal yet another hallway.

Checking to make sure the coast is clear, she takes Lester down the hall to a large office. She tells him to take off his winter gear and hop up onto the examination table before locking the windowless door behind them. “Mr. Malvo tells me he shot you.”

Lester takes a deep breath, slipping off his coat before stuffing his hat and gloves into one sleeve and hanging it on the corner stand. “He shot me through someone else.”

“Even better.” The woman snatches a pair of spectacles off the desk in the corner and puts them on, pulling a small trolley with her over to the examination table. “You squeamish, Mr. Nygaard?”

He opens his mouth to say _'No_ ', but the look she gives him over the rim of her glasses tells him she won't buy it. Sheepishly, he climbs up onto the table. “Uh...yeah. Yeah, I am.”

She sighs, but doesn't seem to be all that surprised. Gently, she rolls up his shirt sleeve and begins unravelling the gauze, dropping it into a tiny metal dish on top of the trolley once it's been completely removed. There are scalpels and other sharp— _very_ sharp implements laid out beside the metal dish, but Lester tries hard not to look at them. This somehow manages to amuse her. “Deep breaths, Mr. Nygaard. I'm not going to start digging around until I've sedated you. My team and I are going to work on you in the operating room, I'm just waiting for my associate to leave the goddamn building already.”

“Alright, but who are you?”

She taps the side of her nose and smiles. “That's no concern of yours, darling.”

“You owe Malvo a favour?”

“I owe him a lot of favours,” she replies uncomfortably. Frowning, she tilts his hand a little to one side and tuts at him under her breath. “I'm so glad you waited a small eternity to get this looked at. You feel feverish at all, Mr. Nygaard?”

“Not at the moment, no.”

“Well, I hope you've learned something from this experience then.”

“Don't trust a stranger?”

She laughs suddenly and it startles him. “Look, I'm not going to lie to you, finding yourself indebted to a man like Lorne Malvo isn't exactly the greatest feeling in the world, but he teaches life's lessons better than anyone else I know... You've ever heard the story about the Wooden Idol?”

Baffled, Lester shakes his head.

“There's this one man who's poorer than dirt, but who's always been lawful and kind,” she replies, dropping his hand gently onto his lap. “He works hard and prays every morning and every night to this wooden god that he keeps on the mantelpiece, but, day in and day out, he's just as poor as he was when he was a young boy. One day, though, he's had enough. So he takes it by the legs and dashes it against the floor, and hundreds of gold coins spill out from the shattered idol... Do you get it?”

Lester shifts uncomfortably in his seat.

Sighing, the woman says, “The wooden idol is not going to answer anyone's prayers—it's a false god. So you can follow all the rules to a T, Mr. Nygaard, but the universe really only yields to force. That's the moral of the story. That's the greatest lesson you can learn from this whole experience.”

Slowly, Lester nods.

Malvo had said pretty much the same thing himself, that they were all nothing more than apes; that this was really a world without rules.

A part of Lester can't help but believe that too. Humans are, after all, just another kind of animal. But...of all the other animals Lester can think of, humans were also the only one's capable of killing for the sole sake of killing.

And maybe...maybe that's why they needed rules.

Lester knows he's not exactly in the best position to preach, but he can't help himself when he says, “He was a poor man praying to a material god for material goods. If you look at it that way, in the end, his prayers were answered. Or what if the idol hadn't been filled with anything at all? He'd then simply be just a poor man without a god. Whatever the case may be, you can't argue that brute force is the answer to everything.”

The woman looks stunned for a moment, but then she smiles a little, as though she understands what it is he means and maybe she agrees, but she still pities him more than anything else. “Malvo is going to kill you one of these days, darling. Maybe not in the literal sense, but something's going to die. You understand that...don't you?”

“I guess so...”

Taking a deep breath, she glances at the office clock. “I'm going to go over a bit of personal information with you now. Allergies, medical history—the usual song and dance. Then, in a short while, you're going to lie back and forget we ever had this conversation.”

Lester nods, but he can't help but ask, “Is he...is he threatening to kill you? Is that why you're doing this for him? Or...is it something else?”

“You ever killed somebody before, Mr. Nygaard?” She asks out of the blue.

Lester swallows, then nods. He can feel the blood pumping in his injured hand.

She glances at the clock again. For a moment, all Lester can hear is the sound of muffled voices out in the hallway and the rhythmic ticking of the second hand.

Quietly, she says, “Me too.”

 

~*~

“ _A poor man, who longed to get rich, used to pray day and night for wealth, to a Wooden Idol which he had in his house. Not withstanding all his prayers, instead of becoming richer, he got poorer. Out of all patience with his Idol, he one day took it by the legs, and dashed it to pieces upon the floor. Hundreds of gold pieces, which had been hidden in the body, flew about the room. Transported at the sight, he exclaimed, 'How have I wasted my time in worshipping a graceless deity, who yields to force what he would not grant to prayers!'_ ”

- _Aesop's fable, “The Man and the Wooden Idol” (as told by the JBR collection)_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed!


	4. Proverbs 24: 10-12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted to apologize for the delay and to thank you for being so patient with me. I'm also sorry that this turned out to be another short chapter. There's much more ahead though, believe me. ;)
> 
> I also wanted to warn you that I will be away for the next three weeks on vacation and, as such, probably won't get chapter 5 done before then, unless I somehow manage to belt it out in a couple of days. So, please, don't think that I've abandoned this story *bows head graciously*
> 
> EDIT: Special thanks to The_Silent_Writer for agreeing to wade through this mess and beta my work for me! You, my dear, are incredible!

Lester wakes up sometime later in the day feeling heavy and groggy, lying on one of the gurneys in the post-op room. He opens his eyes to find an IV hooked up to his left arm and two female nurses leaning over his bed, one of which is chatting heatedly about how she found 400 late-night text messages on her “ex”-boyfriend's cell phone from some woman in Cloquet. Lester wants to interrupt her there, to perhaps ask how long he's been unconscious, but he can't seem to find the strength to move through his drug-induced haze. So instead he lies there, quietly, as he waits for the odd sensation of swimming through molasses to fade, somewhat amused despite himself as the woman goes on to describe how she exacted her revenge by adding hair removal cream to her ex's conditioner.

This gets a laugh out of both women, followed by a brief moment of silence. During this little lull in their conversation, they both happen to look down and see Lester staring up at them.

This gives each of them a considerable start.

The chatty nurse is the first one to collect herself after flinching away from the bed, pressing a hand against her chest as though to still her racing heart, “Sorry hon, you've been out cold longer than most. We were beginning to worry.”

“The doctor should be on her way to check up on you soon,” adds the other nurse, a young brunette. She looks a little nervous, but grins in a halfhearted attempt hide it. “Best plastic surgeon this side of the Atlantic, believe me...How are you feeling?”

 _Like the living dead_. About the only part of his body that can currently move of it's own volition is his stomach, and it's only concern with life at the moment seems to be doing as many consecutive somersaults as possible in 60 seconds.

_Hello nausea, old friend..._

It takes him a while, but eventually he manages to say, “Woozy...”

This must be the standard response, because almost immediately the chatty nurse is bending down beside the bed to pick up a small plastic bucket. Helping him to sit up, she deposits the bucket on his lap and laughs good-naturedly, “Let it all out then, hon.”

There isn't much for him _to_ let out, but he dry heaves a couple of times until the feeling passes. She disappears momentarily while he's clutching the bucket close to his chest to grab him a cup of ginger ale, which she warns him not to gulp.

He takes the proffered cup and mouths a _'thank you'_ , and it's while he's sitting there taking one small sip after another that she completely blindsides him by asking, “You're with that hit man, right?”

As her exact choice of words and the casual tone of voice with which she chose to deliver them sinks in, Lester slowly lifts his head to stare at the woman in no small amount of surprise or confusion. He knew that his surgeon was well aware of what kind of man Malvo was, but he honestly hadn't stopped to consider what the rest of her staff knew or didn't know about the man.

The brunette suddenly looks downright terrified, as though any discussion of Lorne Malvo in this facility is supposed to be taboo. Her companion, on the other hand, doesn't appear to give a damn. It is then that Lester realizes he's seen her somewhere before.

If he had to guess, Lester would put the woman in her early 40s. Her hair is blond and her eyes are the most alluring colour of cornflower blue, but she has deep crows feet and an almost leathery quality to her heavily sun-tanned skin. They're very distinct features, to be sure, but they bring no specific memory to mind, despite the fact that he feels like he's seen her not too long ago.

He knows for certain that he's seen her though, there's no denying that. The familiarity of her face actually gives him the creeps.

He figures he must remember her somewhere from the news...

“I've only seen him once before a couple of years ago, when he needed a bit of patching up himself,” the woman clarifies. “Dark hair, dark eyes, ridiculous bangs—you know who I mean?”

“Yeah,” he says quietly. “I know who you mean.”

“Who is he?”

Lester sips a little more of his ginger ale to stall for time. He wonders if this woman realizes she's treading on dangerous grounds. “I can give you a name, but I'm not even sure it's his real one...”

This doesn't seem to deter her in the least. “So?”

“Look...I don't mean to be impolite, but please don't ask me about him. I think the less you know, the better off you'll be.”

She smiles just a smidgen then, but there's a hard edge to it that suggests that this is not a woman who is accustomed to being told _'no'_.“ If he doesn't know you've said anything though, what's the problem?”

Lester doesn't know how to reply to that, but he's saved from having to come up with some lame excuse by the sudden appearance of his surgeon as she strolls into the post-op room. When she catches sight of him sitting up on the gurney, she looks genuinely pleased.

“Good to see you've rejoined the waking world,” Stopping at the foot of the bed, his doctor turns to look at the chatty nurse expectantly. “Has anyone picked up his prescription yet?”

“It's on my desk.”

The doctor nods at her once in an almost dismissive manner and the two nurses immediately retreat. The brunette makes a beeline for the door, but the chatty one lingers a little, glancing back at Lester curiously before disappearing after her companion into the hallway.

Lester has absolutely no idea what her issue is, but he can't exactly blame her for her curiosity. After all, there's nothing he'd like to know more at the moment himself than the story behind one Lorne Malvo...

“I got everything out,” his doctor explains. “Nasty piece of work though, and you're running a bit of a fever.”

Honestly, Lester had no idea. On top of everything else he's been feeling lately, he's not sure he would've ever noticed.

“Ideally, I'd send you to the hospital and have them keep you on intravenous antibiotics for a while, but for obvious reasons that's not an option. Instead, I got you some antimicrobial cream, fresh gauze, and an oral prescription of ciprofloxacin. Change the gauze at least once a day. As for the pills, take one twice daily until they're all gone. _Do not_ , for any reason, stop taking them on a whim. We clear?”

“Yes.”

“Perfect.” She glances down at his bandaged hand. “How does it feel?”

Lester tries to wiggle his fingers, but regrets it almost immediately. It feels as though someone's jabbed him repeatedly with a serrated knife. “It hurts.”

“No kidding,” she quips. “The swelling should go down in a while, so grab something to eat and try not to use your hand in the meantime. I don't know how long you and Lorne intend to stay here, but if anything happens, just give me a ring.”

“Is he here yet?”

“No, but I left him a message on his cell phone.”

This is it then. As adamantly as she appeared earlier to want to avoid giving away any personal details about herself, this could very well be his only chance of gathering any additional information on Malvo.

“Do you all work for him?” he asks, trying to sound casual, thinking about those two nurses in particular. He would be honestly surprised if Malvo could keep tab on so many living, breathing people without getting an itchy trigger finger every now and again. “I mean, privately?”

She gives him an cautious look, as though she's not sure if this is information she should be giving away. Then she glances once at the door leading to the exit and, seeming to make a decision, returns her gaze to him. “How do you think most people hire a hitman?”

Sarcastically, he says, “The yellow pages.”

The look on her face tells him that she doesn't appreciate the humour in the slightest, but she continues on, regardless. “Malvo has a middle man in Reno Nevada that offers him most of his jobs. Personally, I owe my services to Malvo, but I've been introduced to this gentleman. This guy then took the liberty of hiring me additional staff. Now, I pull bullets out of many different people whenever my associate happens to be out of town.”

“Which is how often, exactly?”

“In Duluth? I've only had to do surgery on five separate occasions since I moved here, yourself included. Before that, maybe once or twice a year. Most people who are gunned down stay down, if you know what I mean.”

“Have you ever tried to run?”

This question seems to catch her completely off guard. Frowning, she mutters, “Now, why would I _ever_ try something as stupid as _that_?”

“Because if what you're telling me is correct, Malvo did you a favour many years ago. Maybe it's one you didn't even ask for, but now you have to stick your neck out every time someone needs to get stitched up. If I was in that sort of situation, I would try to run...At least once.”

“Are _you_ planning on running?” She asks, glancing anxiously at the door, as though she half-expects him to make a dash for it now.

Lester wonders what kind of trouble she would get in with Malvo if he honestly did.

“No,” he replies. He feels cold all over again, as though his body wants to jump off the gurney despite the trouble he knows it'll cause. “I'm not. He's got blackmail on me, the same way I figure he's got blackmail on you.”

“That's none of your goddamn business,” she replies coolly, “so I think we should end this conversation here and perhaps—”

“I don't care about your history,” he interjects, “honest to God—I just want to know a little about Malvo. Please...I just want to know what to expect from him.”

She stares at him quietly as though she doesn't quite trust him, the silence stretching on for an unbearably long time, until eventually, hesitantly, she shuffles a little closer to the bed.

Lester's honestly expecting her to slap him, so he braces himself for impact, but it never comes. Instead, the woman leans forward against the railing of his gurney and in a low voice says, “In all the years that I have known Lorne Malvo, you are the _only_ other hostage I'm aware of that he's kept alive for more than a day... Now, he and I aren't exactly friends, so what I do know of him is limited, but I can tell you this: the man doesn't do what he does for money; he doesn't have some sob back-story of an abusive childhood either. He does what he does simply because he enjoys it, and he'll continue doing it until all the fun's dried up.

“Why he's chosen to make you a pet project, I haven't got a clue, but then this is a man who gets a kick out of fucking with the natural order of the world. Just do whatever he wants you to do, and do it with relish, because when he gets bored or disappointed he can be one mean son of a bitch.”

Lester feels a little light-headed. He doesn't want to think that the situation he's found himself in is inescapable, but if this woman is truly one of the only other survivors of Malvo's reign of terror, surrender might very well be his only option.

“He wants me to kill someone,” he says after a moment, as though the knowledge that someone's life on the line might move her to divulge a little more information. “No one in particular, at least yet. What would you suggest I do then? Just _kill_ them? _”_

“Darling,” she says with a heavy sigh, leaning back, “if he _really_ wants you to kill someone, rest assured: at least he'll make sure you enjoy it.”

~*~

His surgeon cuts their conversation short there, citing the fact that he needs his rest, and busies herself by changing his IV drip. The chatty nurse returns five minutes later with a white paper bag that has a prescription order sheet and instructions for _'Joan Carlyle'_ stapled to one side. As she hands it to Lester she clearly looks as though she has a burning need to continue _her_ conversation with him, but the surgeon lingers beside his bed, hands tucked into the pockets of her white lab coat as she paces back and forth, so the nurse reluctantly leaves without saying a word. She gives Lester another long, thoughtful look though before she goes.

Lester can't help but wonder whether this woman is keen on becoming a potential friend or foe of his. For someone apparently employed by the same man working for Lorne Malvo, she sure seemed to know less about the business than even Lester did...

He's not entirely sure he'll ever see her again, so he lies back on the gurney and tries to put her from his mind, relaxing a little in the time he has remaining before Malvo returns. After a while though, he begins to feel sluggish again.

It takes him a moment, but it dawns on him eventually that he's been sedated.

“Did...did you—?”

“I did indeed.” His surgeon pauses in her pacing and gives him a cold look. “If a man talks about running, you shouldn't believe him when he says he isn't going to try it, don't you think?”

Frustrated, he yanks the IV out of his arm; she stares at him darkly. “I'm not going to run.”

She opens her mouth to say something, but is interrupted when the back door swings open. They both freeze, as though in tableau, as Malvo steps into the room accompanied by a cold wind. Brushing the newly fallen snow out of his hair, the man looks first at Lester with the IV needle in his hand and then the irritated woman standing next to him.

“Well?” he asks.

Lester is completely petrified, worried that the woman is going to rat him out. After all, she told Lester pretty much nothing of importance about Malvo. She's safe as far as she's concerned.

After a beat though, she simply replies, “He'll live.”

Malvo is silent for a moment, as though he was expecting more. After it's clear that she has nothing left to say, he shifts his focus to Lester. “Can you walk?”

“Uh, yeah.”

The surgeon moves to help him by lowering one of the side railings to his gurney. Lester throws his legs over the edge and somehow manages to slip off the bed without falling flat on his face, although he wobbles considerably as he tries to regain his balance. The surgeon takes a hold of his elbow to steady him and then disappears behind the plastic curtain of the far bed, coming back with his winter jacket and boots. Lester pulls the hat and gloves out of the sleeve, and then awkwardly dresses himself as Malvo watches him quietly from the other side of the room.

Lester imagines the man isn't 'watching' him so much as he's probably thinking about the events of the day. He has no idea where the man went, or what he did to occupy his time, but Malvo seems to be so withdrawn into his own mind that Lester imagines some part of Malvo's grander scheme, whatever it may be, is coming to fruition.

Once he's ready, the surgeon hands Lester the white paper bag, looking calmer than she was a moment ago, almost apologetic. “Take care, Mr. Nygaard...”

“You too, ma'am. Thank you.”

He turns to Malvo, world tilting radically to one side before everything rights itself again. Somehow he manages to stay upright as he follows the man through the door, down the hall, and out into the empty alleyway.

Malvo's SUV is parked at the mouth of the alley, a small white plumb of vapour rising up from it's exhaust pipe into the cold, crisp air. The street ahead is completely void of life, just a white haze of newly fallen snow.

Lester knows that the object of his game is to stay out of the public's eye, but this sudden open emptiness only goes to remind him that he's truly alone in the world.

Alone with Lorne Malvo.

Lester's first instinct upon approaching the SUV is to open the trunk, but Malvo waves him away when he reaches for the handle. “Get in the front.”

Under normal circumstances, Lester would've been thrilled at the prospect of not having to lie down flat in a cramped space for any duration of time, but the sudden change in plans does not bode well coming from a man like Malvo.

Lester doesn't want to know what's in store for him, but there's nothing he can really do about it at the moment, so he walks around to the side of the car and gets into the front passenger seat. His sandwich and bottle of water had been saved from the back and placed on the seat, so he stuffs his prescription bag into the glove compartment and holds the food on his lap.

“You can eat now,” Malvo says as he starts the car and pulls out onto the main road, sounding amused. Lester would like to think he doesn't need permission to go about his daily business, but when he really thinks about it that's clearly no longer the truth.

He's reminded of how hungry he is when he takes the first bite of his sandwich. It's actually not all that bad as far as gas-station sandwiches go, but even if it were a stale piece of bread, he figures it would've tasted just as good. He hasn't eaten for two days. He'll take whatever he can get.

He tries not to rush it, but he finishes it in record breaking time. When he's done, he rolls up the saran-wrap and stuffs it into his coat pocket, and then downs almost half the bottle of water. After a while, he gets this odd feeling in the pit of his stomach, something on the border between starvation and nausea.

He tries not to think about the sensation, staring outside the window in the hope of finding something else to occupy his mind. That's no easy feat though, especially with Malvo sitting quietly in the driver's seat. It's unnerving in a way that words fail to describe.

It dawns on him then that they're now in some suburban area, just a little community full of small squat houses and freshly painted duplexes. Malvo pulls up behind somebody's blue Camaro and then stares across the street at a cheery, one-storey, white house with plastic awnings hanging over the front windows and the brass numbers _806_ nailed above the door. There are no lights on inside, but this doesn't seem to bother Malvo as he puts the car into park and waits.

After a while, Malvo says, “How was Sandra?”

“Hm?” Lester glances at him, but quickly looks away. Having to be so close to the man and having his unwavering gaze fixed solely on his makes Lester feel like someone is walking over his grave. Honest to God, he needs a solid day of rest... “Oh, she was...efficient.”

“She have anything of interest to say?”

“No,” Lester replies, and perhaps a little too quickly, because suddenly Malvo is reaching for him.

Lester holds his injured hand as far from him as he possibly can. Malvo ignores the gesture by sticking his hand between Lester's legs instead, squeezing so goddamn hard once he gets a hold of him that Lester literally sees stars.

Lester's whole world narrows down the crushing sensation in his genitals, gradually moving upward with the pain as it creeps into his lower abdomen. He can barely breathe.

With the nausea, and the surgery, and his apparent fever all stacking up against him, he's honestly surprised he doesn't pass out right then and there.

Malvo loosens his grip after a beat, but doesn't relinquish it entirely. He sits there patiently for the 10-15 minutes it takes Lester to start breathing again, and then says, “What did I tell you about lying to me?”

“...N-not to.”

“Then what were you chatting about?”

Lester hesitates. Malvo's grip tightens marginally. “ _No—_ no! I asked her why she was indebted to you—that's all! _I swear_.”

“And what did she say?”

“Nothing.” Malvo's eyes narrow. Lester tries to swallow the bile rising in the back of his throat. “ _Please—_ she said absolutely nothing. Just to do whatever you tell me to. That's all.”

Malvo stares at him for a while, dark eyes cold and unfeeling, and then, seemingly satisfied with what he finds, releases Lester completely. “You know...I once knew this guy who served overseas in Afghanistan for almost four years, and he told me that one of his most vivid memories had been of the day he and his buddies caught this weirdo chasing a woman through the desert with a machete.”

Malvo turns his gaze on house 806 and smiles, just his usual derisive upward curl of the lips. “Well, I don't remember the exact word for it, but the woman he saved told him that the man they've got hogtied in their tent is the devil. As in, _the_ devil.” Malvo laughs then, as though the idea is simply absurd. “She just woke up that morning and found him in her sons' room, strangling the youngest with his bare hands. When he saw her, he picked up his knife and came after her instead.

“Well, my friend was pretty creeped out by her story and he didn't know what to do with the fellow, so he went back to the tent to question the guy and walked in to find him leaning over the body of one of his buddies, kind of dead-eyed, with another knife in his hand. So my friend shoots the guy, right then and there, no questions asked.”

Malvo licks his lips. “He told me that that's the closest he's ever felt he's been to the devil until he met me.”

Lester closes his eyes and tries to focus on his breathing. After a moment, he opens them to find Malvo staring at him again, still smiling faintly.

“There are so many things I could do to you without killing you, it would make Sigmund Rascher look like a saint” Malvo says. “So consider this your last warning, Lester, or your next indiscretion is going to earn you a personal demonstration.”

Lester has had years of experience dealing with people bigger and stronger than himself, so he knows that the only acceptable response to a threat like that is to nod his head and avert his gaze.

This seems to satisfy Malvo, because he then relaxes into his seat and gestures to the house across the street.

Lester looks up to see a car pull up and a young man with brown hair and a trimmed beard stepping out onto the street. He's bundled up for the inclement weather, but looks cheery despite it all, jogging up the walkway to his front door with something of a skip in his step.

Instinctively, Lester knows that this man is going to die.

“Is that...the blackmailer?”

“Yes.” Shifting in his seat, Malvo reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a folded piece of paper. This he hands to Lester. “His name is Don Chumph. He's the personal trainer of Helena Milos, Stavros' estranged wife.”

Cautiously, Lester unfolds the note. On it is written a phone number.

Lester looks up at him, confused. “I don't understand.”

“I think you can pretty much guess by now that good old Don Chumph is going to die.”

Thinking it is one thing, but hearing verbal confirmation of that idea makes Lester want to shrivel up and die. If Malvo thinks he can make Lester kill this man, he is sorely mistaken. Lester  _can't_. It took an empty marriage and years of abuse just to muster the guts to murder his wife, and even _her_ untimely demise still haunts him.

“You're not ready to kill anyone,” Malvo interjects, seeming to read his mind. “At least, not directly. So consider this your homework: don't do anything.”

“I...what do you mean?”

“You know his name. You know what he looks like and where he lives. You've even got his phone number now. So, either you can warn him that I'm coming, _or_ you can simply hold onto that piece of paper and enjoy the show.”

Lester sits there silently for a moment and watches Malvo as he, in turn, watches the house. He's got that ever present smile on his face, faint but ill-boding, and a strange glint in his dark eyes that gives Lester the chills.

Lester has never before seen someone with such a lust for death.

“If I call...” Lester murmurs, “he could survive this ordeal.”

“True. But if you call him, you don't want to know what I'll do to you.”

Lester glances at the house, now brightly lit and inviting, and then down at the number in his hand.

Solemnly, he folds the piece of paper and tucks it into his pocket.

 

 

~*~

“ _If you faint in the day of adversity,_

_your strength being small;_

_if you hold back from rescuing those taken away to death,_

_those who go staggering to the slaughter;_

_if you say, 'Look, we did not know this'—_

_Does not He who weighs the heart perceive it?_

_Does not He who keeps watch over your soul know it?_

 

_And will He not repay all according to their deeds?”_

 

_\- Proverbs 24: 10-12, on the sin of omission_

_(New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition)_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tend to miss grammar and spelling mistakes when I stare at the same chapter for too long, so please feel free to point any of them out to me.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the chapter!
> 
> (PS: I am not a doctor, nor do I have an real medical training, so please don't take my word for what to do with ciprofloxacin


	5. The truth of immorality

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: You know, when I was editing this chapter for the last time just prior to posting it, it was the wee hours of the night and I kept nodding off. For whatever reason though, my brain kept typing, and I ended up inserting little bits and pieces about ships and soldiers that had absolutely nothing to do with the context of the story. I think I've gone and edited them all out by now, but please feel free to let me know if you find anything else bizarre.
> 
> Otherwise, please enjoy!
> 
> EDIT: Special thanks to The_Silent_Writer for agreeing to wade through this mess and beta my work for me! You, my dear, are incredible!

“ _There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book._

_Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.”_

Oscar Wilde, 'The Picture of Dorian Gray'

 

The phone number feels like a lead weight in his pocket.

Thinking about it and the immense power that's been handed to him is slowly eating away at his sanity, but Lester knows that that is the point of this whole exercise. Malvo wants to accentuate the fact that Lester will always have the means to the do the _'right thing_ ', that all it really takes to redeem himself is a single phone call.

He wants Lester to _squirm._

Lester knows there's no use trying to rationalize how any inactivity on his part makes him more of a coward than a direct accomplice in this man's murder, but the facts speak for themselves. Lester already knows that there's a snowball's chance in hell he'll ever muster the courage to call Don Chumph, but that doesn't make this decision any easier. After all, if he calls the guy tomorrow, Chumph could be out of Minnesota by night fall. Heck, he might even do the smart thing and report Malvo to the police before fleeing for his life.

As it stands, however, Lester doesn't know when Malvo is going to kill Don Chumph or how he plans to go about doing it. Calling the young man, therefore, doesn't necessarily guarantee his survival. Malvo could rig the guy's car with explosives tomorrow morning for all he knows, or slip cyanide into his morning coffee.

Malvo, Lester realizes, is a force of nature.

Once the man has a target in sight, there really is no use trying to stop him.

Lester tries to keep that in mind as Malvo starts the car up and pulls out into the road. They only drive a couple of blocks though before Malvo stops beside an empty schoolyard and reiterates that the safest place for Lester is still in the trunk.

Lester doesn't bother arguing with the man, simply unbuckling his seat belt and slipping out of the car the moment Malvo pulls over to the curb. To be honest, he considers the move a blessing. Sitting there in the front passenger's seat with the man in his periphery, close enough for Malvo to grab and handle him however he wants, isn't doing any good for Lester's blood pressure. He'd take the trunk over Malvo's company any day.

Even so, the ride back to Stavros' property is spent in miserable silence. Lester finds his hand drifting down into his coat pocket to retrieve the phone number, which he reads once before tucking it away again. He's almost tempted to destroy the paper right now, just tear it into a hundred tiny pieces and put an end to his torment. He can only remember the first four digits, after all. There's no way he could contact the man with just that.

Some small part of him though, the part that could still be human, quietly tells him not to. He can't make that decision yet. This is something he really needs to think through first.

So, despite his greater urges, Lester curls in on himself and closes his eyes.

The ride back to Malvo's hideout seems to go on forever.

~*~

Lester figures that Stavros isn't in when they pull up, because Malvo doesn't rush him to the guest house once he's parked the car. Instead, they walk quietly across the snowy yard together around to the back, past the boarded-over swimming pool and a dog house tucked under the lower bows of a fir tree. This surprises Lester, because he hadn't noticed it until now, having failed to see any hint of the animal since he first arrived. Granted, he has been dealing with a concussion, but he imagines he would've spotted its tracks in the snow by now.

“Is there supposed to be a guard dog here?”

“There _was_ a guard dog,” Malvo replies.

Lester's not sure he wants to know the details of that particular story, so he tries to redirect the conversation by asking, “Who else comes here besides Mr. Milos?”

“Occasionally, his asshole head of security, although he really doesn't have a reason to wander the property. There's also a son...” Malvo looks thoughtful for a moment, rummaging in his coat pocket for the keys to the guest house. “He visits, but rarely now that his mother has started the divorce proceedings.”

“Do they both know you're holing up back here?” Lester enquires as he follows the man inside, shrugging off his winter gear as carefully as he can in an effort not to jostle his injured hand. He feels completely drained, as though he'll pass out again the moment he lies down.

“Security is aware of why I'm here. The son, on the other hand, thinks I'm his mother's attorney. Not the sharpest nail in the shed, mind you, but I don't foresee any trouble coming from his corner. He won't be bothering us.”

Malvo sets off immediately into the kitchen, leaving Lester to hover awkwardly in the living room by the door. He would like nothing more than to shuffle off to bed at that moment, but the uncertainty of how much freedom Malvo has actually afforded him has him hesitantly taking up a seat on the sofa instead.

Listening to Malvo fiddle with the coffee machine in the other room, Lester instinctively turns on the TV. He's half hoping that something completely inane is on to take his mind off matters for a minute or two, but fate apparently has other plans for him when he's instead greeted with the image of Chaz's angry face plastered across the small screen.

The television is set to mute, so Lester misses the first few words of whatever it is Chaz is saying, but once he manages to turn the sound on he gets the gist of his brother's message:

 _'—I know the police have yet to say anything on the matter,'_ Chaz says, rubbing his chin the same way their father used to whenever he was frustrated, ' _but_ _ **I**_ _, at least, think he_ _has a lot to answer for. I mean, why the hell would anyone want to come after_ _ **him**_ _? He's an insurance salesman, for God's sake. He goes to church on Sundays and doesn't drink outside of national holidays. Is he in debt with someone? I don't know, but I'd like to think he would've talked about it with his family first.'_

Lester doesn't need to hear anymore to know who or what exactly Chaz is talking about, but already his brother's face is replaced with the scene of two anchormen discussing the finer details of the story: Lester's house had been found in a state of disarray with the man himself nowhere in sight, although signs of forced entry through the back entrance and partial bootprints from a shoe size larger than Lester's own strongly suggest that he had not left willingly.

Lester doesn't remember there being much of a fight, at least not enough to warrant the wreckage photographed in the news. In fact, now that his head has had time to clear, he _distinctly_ recalls simply kneeing Malvo before making a break for his car outside. He wouldn't have put it past Malvo to dress the story up a little though, although why he would want to stick his neck so far out into the public's eye like this by making such a scene seems to be counter-intuitive to what Lester knows of Malvo's undeniably strong sense of self preservation...

Regardless of whatever liberties Malvo decided to take with his property, Lester finds that he is more stunned by his brother's statement than anything else the news has to say about him, especially given how supportive Chaz had seemed to be of Lester in the last couple of days. Lester would have never expected a betrayal of this magnitude, not in a million years...

He doesn't realize Malvo is sitting next to him until the man is leaning over to take the remote from his cold, clammy hands. The man hits _mute_ and then leans back in his seat comfortably, as though he couldn't having picked the timing of the news announcement better himself. “That your baby brother?”

“Yeah,” Lester replies faintly. He knows that Chaz had never really had much faith in Lester's ability as a fully functional human being, but _still_...

“Does he know what happened?”

Lester shakes his head slowly, stunned. “No... I mean, he once told me Pearl was thinking of leaving, but I never assumed...”

“What, that you would ever have anything to do with it?”

He nods.

“Do you know why?”

“I...no. Not really.”

“Because people often look to themselves for inspiration, you know? 'It takes one to know one'.”

Lester blinks, completely baffled. “I don't understand...”

Malvo smirks at him, tilting his head a little to one side, as though having to dumb down the lesson for Lester comes as no surprise to him. “Do you know where your brother was the night Sam Hess died?”

“At home, I suppose...I don't actually see him all that often.”

“The strip joint,” Malvo replies, smile slowly widening, “in a booth at the far back, all by his lonesome, as though he didn't want anyone to really see him there. He's probably been there with friends in the past, maybe for a bachelor party, but I imagine he just couldn't help himself anymore. He had an itch that just needed scratching.”

Lester feels as though he's just been slapped in the face. Both he and Chaz had had a strict Christian upbringing, one that had prevented Lester from looking for comfort elsewhere when his wife slowly began to turn away from him—the same stringent upbringing that had seen Chaz grow to become a respectable young man, marrying a woman Lester considered to be one of the most attractive young ladies in the whole of Minnesota. Why Chaz would ever be tempted to stray was completely beyond Lester's understanding.

“I don't believe you,” Lester says, purely on impulse, because Malvo's explanation is too incredulous to believe. “He can be a complete ass sometimes, I'll give you that, but he loves his wife.”

“So did you.”

Lester physically flinches at that statement, because, yeah...yeah, he had loved her. Quite a bit, actually.

In fact, she had honestly been the only woman he had ever wanted to marry.

Lester rubs his eyes, then glances back at the muted television set. Some old woman in a lavender dress is on screen now, holding an almost comically enlarged $5,000 cheque addressed to the new Bemidji Youth Centre. She's smiling like this meagre amount of money is going to solve all the world's problems, as though $5,000 could put an end to even a single child's worries for a year.

Lester looks down at his hands in his lap.

“Tell you what,” Malvo says softly, close enough to Lester's ear that he can feel the man's breath on the side of his face, “if the police were to ask your brother where he was the night of your wife's murder, what do you imagine he'd say?”

“That he was with his family. Or his friends.”

“And if he wasn't?”

Absently, Lester realizes he's chewing on the inside of his lip, a bad habit he thought he had kicked years ago. “He'd find someone to back up his story. He's kind of spoiled for choice as far as friends go.”

“What if they themselves suspected him of the murder?”

Lester shifts uncomfortably in his seat, leaning away from Malvo. He doesn't understand why the man is pushing this matter as hard as he is when it's perfectly clear to anyone that Chaz is the last person on earth that would try to commit murder. “Then probably not, I suppose, but I think he's more likely to be struck by lightning than get pulled in for questioning by the police.”

Malvo gives a halfhearted shrug, as though he was only making a suggestion. “Fair enough, but you _do_ know how the police function, right?”

“...Are you talking about in Bemidji or elsewhere?”

Malvo laughs suddenly, loud and sharp like the solid retort of gunfire, as though Lester was making a joke. “ _Jesus Christ..._ Forgetting about Bemidji for a moment here, most law officials act on evidence. It's simple really. Someone throws them a bone and then they follow the rest of the trail off the goddamn cliff.”

Lester blinks.

He knows _exactly_ where this is going now...

“You want to _frame_ him?”

“No,” Malvo replies. “But you do.”

“I do _not—_ ”

Malvo leans in close again and that shuts Lester up like nothing else ever could. “Please tell me I didn't just see your brother tell the nation that you fail so _miserably_ at life that the mere though tof you having an idea of your own is practically impossible.”

“Yeah, well...” Frustrated, Lester looks away at the curtains. Outside, the lights to the mansion just turned on. “Maybe telling the country that I'm too stupid to pull off a crime works in my favour.”

“It does.”

Lester glances back at the man curiously. “It does?”

“Oh, you'll see.”

In the kitchen, the alarm to the coffee machine goes off. Malvo continues to stare at him for a moment, at the dark circles around Lester's eyes and the hard line at the corner of his mouth before, almost reluctantly, getting up off the couch. He reminds Lester suddenly of the tigers at the zoo, the ones that like to lie right up alongside the glass partition and watch the crowd with an air of indifference. Not often, but occasionally, Lester had seen them bear their teeth silently at small children too near the glass, as though they were imagining how easy it would be to wedge their tiny little heads into their gaping maws...

Watching the man disappear into the kitchen, Lester feels as though he himself had just had his head wedged somewhere awful. He doesn't think he's ever felt this anxious before in his life, including all the years in which Pearl had made him feel completely useless.

Thinking about her gets him into thinking about Chaz again. He can't help but wonder if anyone _would_ actually find anything suspicious about his brother's statement. At the very least, Kitty would think something was off about it. She had always been kind to Lester.

He's startled from his reverie when his prescription bag suddenly lands in his lap. Malvo is back in the living room again, sipping his coffee, looking about as nonchalant as ever. “Do you know what tomorrow is?”

Baffled, Lester shrugs. “Sunday?”

“Your proverbial day of rest.” Another sip. “Don't set foot outside the house. Got it?”

Nodding, Lester takes that as his cue to leave and grabs the prescription bag, darting briefly into the kitchen to grab a glass of water before retreating to the bedroom. He wants to shut the door behind him completely for a little privacy, but settles instead for closing it half way. If Malvo is upset with the gesture, Lester's sure he won't hesitate to open it.

Tired, he drops down onto the bed and glances at the instruction sheet stapled to the front of the bag. He doubts he'll have to change the gauze on his hand until sometime tomorrow afternoon, but he knows that he'll have to start on the ciprofloxacin today, so he pulls out the large yellow bottle and pops the cap, not at all expecting to see the phone number scrawled in neon pink on the underside of the lid.

Nor is he expecting to see the _'I'm ready whenever you are, hon!'_ or the smiley face written beneath it.

At first, he doesn't know how to interpret this bizarre message, but then he glances back at the instruction sheet. ' _Joan Carlyle'._ The inquisitive nurse, he's sure. She'd been practically chomping at the bit to have a word with him about Malvo, so her strange gesture really shouldn't have come as much of a surprise to him, although her connection to the hitman is still something of a mystery.

Lester doesn't know what kind of people Malvo typically attracts, but he honestly doubts this woman is a jilted lover. If anything, she could be another gun-for-hire—or, even _worse_ , a government agent.

Considering the phone number already burning a hole in his pocket, Lester has no idea what to do with this new turn of events. There's a part of him that's desperate to give the woman a ring, but he isn't too keen on doing something that rash until he has a better idea of the danger she could possibly pose to him. Then there's Malvo's reaction to take into consideration. If the man ever got wind that Lester was handing out information on him, there's no telling what he would do.

Now that he thinks about it, Lester's not entirely sure he can call much of _anyone_ at the moment. After all, he hasn't seen a single phone in the guest house yet, and he seriously doubts Malvo would be willing to let him borrow his cell phone for a personal call. In short, Lester really has no way of contacting the outside world.

Unless...

Lester pops one of the pills into his mouth and chases it down with a sip of water. The mansion is off limits. Even if Malvo claimed to have disabled the security cameras, there's no telling whether or not he'll turn them back on again tomorrow morning. He was, after all, apparently going to leave Lester to his own devices.

Frustrated, Lester drops the pill bottle back into the bag and sets it next to his glass of water on the nightstand. There's too much to consider at the moment, and he knows he won't be able to connect the dots until he's running at 100% again. He needs to sleep, and he's not going to miss this opportunity for a little peace and quiet while Malvo's given it to him.

Exhausted, he crawls under the bed covers and turns over onto his side to face the door. He can hear Malvo moving around in the kitchen, his shadow drifting back and forth across the wall. It's mesmerizing, in a way. The shadow of a killer. As smooth and silent as the man himself.

Closing his eyes, Lester drifts off to sleep.

~*~

The second the hammer connects with the crown of her head, he regrets everything.

Some small part of him that's still innocent tells him that it's not too late. That people can survive head injuries. That he can stop now and call 911.

That he can save her.

Some other part of him, much louder than all the rest, tells him that, dead or not dead, the hands of justice are going to squeeze the life out of him all the same. That whatever damage he's done is irreparable. That he's been some small, snivelling, pitiful thing all his life and that he might as well enjoy this moment of triumph while it lasts.

That he should simply finish her off instead.

So he kneels over her prone body and lays to waste all that he once knew, letting the hammer fall again and again and again, as though fate has taken the reins now and he's simply going through the motions. Freedom, after all, is just an illusion.

When he's done, he's out of breath. The adrenaline has sucked all the warmth from his limbs and he's trembling hard, heart pounding in his chest. It all seems so surreal. She's dead now and there's no denying it. Even if EMS were to run down the basement stairs now and take over, there's nothing anyone could do to bring her back.

Then she takes in one, long, rattling breath.

Terrified, he falls back onto her legs. He scrambles up then and away from her, dropping his hammer in his haste as she takes yet another laborious breath in, eyes blank and vacant, fixed up on the basement ceiling.

Lester doesn't know what to do.

“You're killing her.”

Startled, Lester looks up to find Chaz perched at the top of the basement stairs, crouching awkwardly to get a good look at Pearl below the railing. His brother stares at his wife's struggling form for a moment before shifting his eyes to Lester, brows furrowed, as though he's finally discovered the most disgusting creature on earth.

“God, Lester. What the _fuck_ is wrong with you?”

“I-I don't know,” Lester sputters. Already his mind is racing, wondering how much his brother has actually seen. Maybe he can feign ignorance, pretend that he's merely stumbled across this gruesome tableau. “I didn't—”

“I _saw_ you, Lester,” Chaz snaps. “I saw you, you little _fuck_.”

His words feel like a slap in the face. Lester knows that there's no use trying to argue with the man.

Immediately, his mind wanders to the hammer.

Chaz's face slowly changes then, as though he's only just realized what Lester must be thinking now. He goes about as white as a sheet, glancing down at the tool lying at Lester's feet, muscles coiling like a tightly wound spring.

Lester Nygaard, his brother, is a cold-hearted murderer.

They move at the same time. Lester kneels briefly to grab the hammer as Chaz darts up the basement stairs. Lester's lived here for years though. He takes the stairs two at a time, wholly aware that the top step is slightly higher than all the rest.

This step proves to be Chaz's undoing as he trips spectacularly over it and comes crashing down to the living room floor with a solid thud. He kicks out immediately at Lester once he hits the ground, screaming when he realizes his brother has already reached the top of the stairs, but Lester is too focused on the task at hand to let the hit Chaz lands to his left knee slow him down.

It takes him a while, but soon Lester is straddling Chaz's waist and raising his hammer high above his head, like it's the most natural position in the world. It gives him a little thrill to see his brother cowering beneath him, and for a second he pauses, just to commend it to memory.

Dimly, he's aware that Chaz is crying out his name, pleading with him, writhing beneath him like some spineless thing from the muck. There's no going back after this. What he's about to do cannot be undone.

Lester lets the hammer fall once more.

Lester delivers three solid swings before he can shut his brother up. All at once, Chaz's muscles seem to lose their tone, going completely limp beneath him. Lester waits a moment longer to see if he'll somehow revive himself like Pearl had, but there's no vacant stare or rattling breath. This is it then.

Chaz Nygaard, his brother, is dead.

The blood pools on the floor around Chaz's head like a halo, creeping slowly outward, soaking Lester's trousers at the knees. There's more of it than there was with Pearl, he thinks, although what this signifies is beyond him.

To his right, someone claps.

He turns his head to see who it is, wondering how many people he'll have to go through before he can call it a night. He's somehow not surprised to discover Lorne Malvo sitting at his kitchen table, smiling as though he's couldn't have done it better himself.

Exhausted, Lester pulls himself up off his brother's body and collapses on the floor next to him. Chaz's blood seeps into Lester shirt and hair, but he doesn't give a damn. It's over now.

Now, he can rest.

“Not yet,” Malvo interjects. He rises up out of his seat to stand over Lester, shaking his head. “It's not over until I say it's over.”

“Please...” Lester begs.

Still shaking his head, Malvo descends.

~*~

Lester wakes with a start.

He's covered in a cold sweat and shivering, dimly aware that his quilt is missing. Cracking his eyes open, he realizes he's kicked it down to his knees where it's now tangled around his legs. Carefully, he extracts himself, then rolls over onto his back to stare up at the white stucco ceiling as he mulls over his dream.

If he were honest with himself, Chaz had never liked him very much. As children, the age gap between them was too great for either of them to be truly interested in what sports or hobbies the other brother was interested in, and any time they would've spent together as a family was eaten up by the special excursions their father always used to have alone with Chaz. It was like growing up with a total stranger in the house, someone who slept under the same roof as you and ate the same food, but who knew next to nothing about you besides your face and name.

Even so, Lester knows he would never be able to kill Chaz. Pearl...well, Pearl had always been a stranger to him too, but whereas she would've come after Lester like a bat out of hell for any indiscretion he might've unknowingly made, Chaz would sooner shake his head and walk away. Lester could actually count the number of screaming matches he's had with Chaz on one hand, they were so infrequent. Their relationship had been held together over the years by a cool but mutual sense of indifference, and that was just fine by them.

Still, Chaz had, more or less, just thrown him under the bus with his little tantrum on the evening news. As if being under constant scrutiny by Molly Solverson wasn't enough, having your own flesh and blood doubt your innocence was not going to look too good for Lester in Bill Oswalt's eyes.

Lester sighs. He doesn't hear anyone moving around outside the bedroom, so he imagines Malvo is either taking a break or he's truly left Lester to his own devices for the day. Whatever the case may be, Lester wants to wash away the cold sweat and check up on his hand, so he turns over onto his side and pushes himself up out of bed.

His hand actually doesn't hurt as much today. There's a constant ache to it now, but the swelling's gone down considerably and the colour has returned to his fingers.

He collects a change of clothes from his suitcase and, taking the prescription bag in hand, shuffles into the en suite. The first thing he does is unravel the gauze on his hand and inspect the wound. There's a angry red line where 'Sandra' made an incision, closed up now by stitches, as well as a bit of bruising on the back of his hand around the wound. He lathers on some of the medicinal cream and re-wraps his hand, and then decides to start a bath rather than running the risk of soaking the fresh gauze in a shower.

It takes a while, but as he goes through the motions of his usual morning routine he starts to wake up. His head still hurts where Malvo took a swing at him, and he's a bit sore from when the man grabbed him yesterday, but, overall, he's still in one piece.

Looking back on it now, he has no idea how he's managed to survive this whole ordeal up until this point. If someone had warned him that this was what was to follow his unsettling encounter with Sam Hess and his sons, Lester never would've believed them. In fact, this feels more like something out of a black comedy than anything else. He's still waiting for the moment someone will tap him on the shoulder and tell him it's all been a joke.

Musing on all the might-of-beens isn't going to get him anywhere though, so he finishes up his short soak in the tub and ventures quietly out into the kitchen. Instinctively, he's worried that Malvo is still lurking somewhere in the guest house, but he knows that there's really no use hiding all day in the bedroom. If Malvo wanted to speak with him, there's very little a door could do to stop him.

All the same, Lester still hesitates in the doorway, listening quietly for any signs of movement. All he gets though is the subtle ticking of the clock hanging above the kitchen sink and the sound of a bird chirping outside.

The clock reads 10:08 am. The TV's off and all the blinds are closed in the living room.

Lorne Malvo is nowhere in sight.

Releasing the breath he didn't realize he'd been holding, Lester sets up the coffee machine and rummages through the kitchen shelves in search of food. There's actually a considerable amount of canned vegetables and soups in there, no doubt from Phoenix Farms, as well as a variety of granola bars and a couple of boxes of pancake mix. Nothing is dated over six months, but there's a thin film of dust over everything, so Lester knows Malvo hadn't put any of it there. He doubts the man plans on staying there any longer than absolutely necessary.

Seeing as Malvo hasn't left him any instructions on what he can or cannot eat, Lester grabs a couple of the blueberry granola bars and washes them down with a steaming cup of coffee. Then he cleans up whatever mess he's made and retreats to the living room.

There really is no phone inside the guest house. Either Mr. Milos never thought to add one, or, more likely, Malvo's removed that bit of temptation from Lester's sight. But why Malvo would give him Don Chumph's phone number if he knew Lester would have no way of ever contacting the man seems kind of counter-intuitive to putting Lester in a moral crisis in the first place.

Again, Lester's mind drifts to the mansion. That must be the name of the game then—Malvo wants to see how far Lester's willing to wander out of boundaries while he's not there to keep an eye on him. Either that, or he wants to know how clever Lester can be in getting a hold of Don Chumph without breaking any of his rules.

For all Lester knows, Malvo could be out there killing the guy that very moment, so Lester tries to put the smiling young man's face from his mind for the time being. _'Joan Carlyle'_ however...well, he has no idea why he would want to risk his neck trying to get a hold of her, unless, of course, she had a score to settle with Malvo and enough firepower with which to do it...

Meandering over to the mansion isn't in the cards for him today though, because he's sure the whole point of the conversation Malvo had with him yesterday about his brother was supposed to get him into thinking about how he can actually frame Chaz for Pearl's murder. Lester has no idea how that would even be possible, but if he doesn't come up with a way on his own he's sure Malvo will have a few choice words for him in the evening.

Still, Lester's a bit curious about his neighbour and the fact that Stavros has no idea that there's a fugitive holing up inside his guest house, so he walks over to the blinds and, sticking his finger between two strips, takes a peek at the mansion.

Except what he sees outside isn't a mansion. It's somebody else peeking in at him.

Startled, he jumps back and almost trips over the corner of the coffee table. Whoever it is that saw him is now yelling something, muffled, through the window. This is followed by a short pause before there's a sudden, heavy knock on the door.

Lester honestly has no idea what to do. Malvo mentioned the head of security earlier, but Lester assumes the guy would've already known that Malvo was staying at the guest house. Why he would come over _now_ of all times to check up on the hitman is beyond him.

There's another knock at the door and then a polite pause. Lester knows he'll have to open it sooner or later.

He'll have to come up with an alibi as he goes.

Heart racing, he unlocks the front door and pulls it open just a crack. Outside is a young man with a shovel braced against his left shoulder, smiling in such a wide, open way that Lester honestly doubts he works for security. Even so, Lester knows that if this kid recognizes his picture from the news, his cover is as good as blown.

“Hi,” Lester murmurs, a little lost for words.

“Dad didn't mention we were having guests, or I would've shovelled the path up to your place yesterday,” the young man says in way of an introduction. He drops the shovel then and leans it against the outside wall of the guest house by the door. “Didn't mean to scare you. I saw your boot prints in the snow and thought it was a little weird.”

This is the son, then.

The son Malvo told him not to worry about...

“That's no problem,” Lester says cautiously, stepping to one side as the young man brushes past him into the guest house. “Is there...is there something I can do for you?”

“Oh no!” He chirps. “Just wanted to warm up. I think I need new gloves.” Pulling off said gloves and tucking them into one of his front coat pockets, the young man cups his hands and blows warm air into them. “Darn cold today, wouldn't you say?”

Having no idea what else to do, Lester closes and locks the front door. “Yeah, I guess it is...”

“Sorry for intruding, I haven't been over to see dad in a while.” Blowing into his hands again, the young man gives Lester a curious once over then, eyes inevitably zeroing in on Lester's own injured hand. “Wow, what happened to you?”

Nervous, Lester steps past his unexpected guest and flees into the kitchen. What has he been telling everyone back home lately? He can't quite remember. “Uh, rusty nail in the shed—say, do you want some coffee?”

“That would be lovely!” Stamping the snow out of his boots, the kid tugs them off by the door and then follows Lester into the other room. “I'm Dmitri, by the way. You working for my dad?”

Lester doesn't actually know whether or not Mr. Milos knows about his being there, so he has no idea what's safe to tell Dmitri without worrying about it making its way back to Stavros.

Changing the coffee grounds and water in the machine, Lester resets the coffee machine and turns around to face the kid. Then he leans back against the counter and crosses his arms, wishing for once in his life that Malvo was there to deal with the situation.

 _Then again_ , Malvo's solution probably would've been a bloody affair, so perhaps it was for the best that he was away...

Lester's not sure how far he can carry a lie with the kid, so he starts with something just a little shy of the truth. “I don't, actually, no, but my partner does. I'm not supposed to be here, you see, but I had to come up this way anyway for my surgery in Duluth so he...so, I...”

Eyes widening, Dmitri gives him the most appalled look he's ever seen to date. For a moment, Lester's worried that he's said the wrong thing, but then Dmitri leans over to rub his shoulder kindly, nodding slowly as though he understands absolutely everything. “No, it's cool. My dad's old fashioned. Like, _by-the-bible_ old fashioned. Personally though, I don't care. He doesn't need to know about you as far as I'm concerned.”

Lester has no idea what conclusion Dmitri has drawn from their brief conversation, but he's so relieved that the young man isn't going to mention him to his father that he decides against asking the kid for his line of reasoning. “Thank you—that means a lot to me. You have no idea...”

Dmitri smiles benignly. “Oh, no problem. I used to have a homosexual friend in high school, but he ran away to San Francisco before we graduated. He was really sweet.” Sighing sadly, Dmitri leans against the counter beside him. “Dad hated him.”

Lester winces a little. Gay, huh?

Oh well, he was called much worse in high school...

Honestly, though, Lester doesn't care what Dmitri thinks. The kid is actually something of a blessing in disguise, now that he's had a chance to really think about it.

Clearing his throat, Lester tries to look a little concerned as he says, “I know you probably don't know, Dmitri, but I was wondering if you can tell me why there isn't a phone in here...?”

“There isn't?” Frowning, Dmitri's gaze shifts across the room to the small counter space beside the fridge. He looks genuinely surprised to see nothing there. “I'll be damned. Maybe it's broken. You want me to ask Wally about getting you guys another one?”

Lester doesn't know who Wally is and he really has no interest in meeting him either, so he quickly shakes his head. “I don't think we'll be here that long, but I wanted to make a call and my partner forgot his cell phone at home. You wouldn't happen to have one on you though, would you?”

Almost immediately, Dmitri starts rummaging through the numerous pockets on his bulky winter coat. “I think so...Say, what is your partner anyway?”

Lester can't quite remember what Malvo told him earlier, but he thinks the man might've mentioned something about posing as an attorney. “A lawyer.”

“Oh yeah, for the divorce, right?” Dmitri's face falls a little at the reminder of his parent's spilt. He rummages a moment longer before slumping his shoulders in defeat. “Must've left it at mom's. I won't be seeing her until tomorrow or the day after though. Can you wait that long or is it really important?”

“I can wait,” Lester replies. “It's no problem, really. You're still a godsend.”

Dmitri smiles so hard he's practically glowing. “You're so _nice_. Dad and Wally are always coming after me because they think I'm slow. They can both be pretty awful sometimes.”

“I know the feeling,” Lester murmurs, thinking about how annoyed both Chaz and his father had always seemed to be whenever they thought he was being too timid. It just felt as though there was no way of appeasing anyone in the world anymore.

“Hey, you mind if I have a seat?”

“Not at all.” Waving Dmitri off into the living room, Lester takes a quick peek at the still percolating coffee machine and then follows him into the adjoining room. “Actually, could I ask you for another favour, Dmitri?”

“As long as it isn't illegal,” the kid jokes.

Lester laughs weakly at the irony of that statement, taking a seat next to Dmitri on the couch “No, nothing like that. I just want to ask you not to mention meeting me to my partner, should you ever encounter him. He's not as open as I am, you know, and I promised to stay out of sight...”

“No worries. After I shovel, he won't see my bootprints. Don't be surprised if Wally comes knocking, though.” Dmitri makes a sour face. “The security cameras have been on the fritz lately, and dad's more paranoid than usual.”

“Is he always this paranoid?”

“Not really, no...just more so in the past little while. A week ago, he was convinced that there was blood in the shower.” Smiling sadly, Dmitri shakes his head. “But I think he just imagined it, you know? I came over to visit anyway, because he's been really stressed since King died. He just needs to relax.”

Lester would beg to differ, but, then, this kid doesn't _know_ Lorne Malvo. He's willing to bet that _'King'_ is the absentee guard dog and that the blood in the shower is yet another one of Lorne's cruel jokes. Why Malvo would want to sabotage his own employer though is a little beyond him at the moment, although he should've figured out as much when he first found out Malvo hadn't yet killed the man's blackmailer.

“I'm sure it'll pass,” Lester says in way of comfort, although he really knows it won't. “Sounds kind of biblical though, don't you think? Maybe your father should see a therapist.”

“ _You_ try telling him that,” the kid jokes. Then he pauses. “Or, you know, you really _could._ You could come inside with me one day. I'd just tell him you're a friend.”

Lester laughs nervously. “Oh, no—thank you, but _no_ , really. I don't want to risk it.”

“Fair enough, but it's actually pretty cold in here.” Dmitri glances over at the pitiful heater under the window. “We only ever get guests in the summer, so it's not properly insulated. You could come inside the house sometime, maybe even just for lunch.”

“I'd still get caught on camera.”

“I could just turn off the security before heading over to grab you. Wally hasn't really been relying on them lately, and the new set hasn't been delivered yet.”

That...could actually work. Lester could wander over to the mansion without Malvo ever knowing and use the phone in there. And if Malvo was ever frustrated with the sudden lack of video footage, it's his own goddamn fault for meddling with the thing in the first place.

Then again...

“You've already been caught on camera coming over here, long after my partner's been recorded leaving.” Gingerly, Lester rubs the bridge of his nose. “Your father's already going to know about me.”

“Dad's home at the moment, but he doesn't check the cameras,” Dmitri assures him. “Wally's away though, so when I go back in I'll just delete the last hour or so if that makes you feel any better.”

Lester's never felt so relieved in his entire life. “Yes— _yes,_ that would be perfect. _Thank you_. You are a godsend.”

Dmitri smiles again. Lester can't believe how kind he is— _naive_ , undoubtedly, but his compassion is far more striking. Lester kind of wishes there were more people like him in the world.

He's suddenly very terrified that, someday, Dmitri Stavros might actually cross paths with Lorne Malvo...

The coffee machine beeps in the other room, so Lester excuses himself to grab the kid a cup. Dmitri takes it from him gratefully when he returns, then glances at the digital clock on the stereo set. “I'll have to get going soon. What time is your partner coming back?”

“No clue.”

It could be at any moment, now that he thinks about it.

His anxiety must show on his face because Dmitri downs his cup of coffee in five minutes flat. “Dad's probably wondering what's taking me so long.”

“Why are you are shovelling all by yourself anyway? Your father's property is pretty massive.”

“Dad told the staff to take a hike while he sorts himself out, so I just decided to do it.” Setting his empty cup on the coffee table, Dmitri pulls on his gloves and heads over to the door. “No one's going to be home tomorrow. Would you like me to drop by after your partner leaves?”

“Yeah, sure, but wait until he's been gone twenty minutes or so first, okay?”

“No problemo.” Dmitri gives him an odd sort of salute and then steps outside, taking up his shovel. He pauses though before closing the door behind him and says, “Hey, you like riddles?”

Lester shrugs. “Uh, yeah, sure. I guess.”

“Okay then, try this—how is _welder_ like a woman in love?”

Lester imagines it must have something to do with heat, but it takes him a minute longer to come up with a plausible answer. “I don't know? They both...carry a torch?”

Dmitri laughs in response, looking so genuinely pleased that Lester can't help but join him. “You got it! You're the first, you know that?”

“Lucky guess.”

“It's a good guess.” Dmitri glances over his shoulder at the mansion, then back at Lester. “Say, I never did get your name.”

Drawing up a blank, Lester stands there for a moment and stares dumbly at Dmitri, willing his brain to work again. The first thing that pops into his mind is ice cream, so he immediately says, “Jerry. Sorry about that—I thought I told you earlier.”

“No worries. I'll see you tomorrow then, Jerry.”

“Tomorrow it is.”

Dmitri finally closes the door and sets about shovelling the snow in front of the guest house. He pauses once to wave to Lester where he's standing by the window, and then walks across the yard to return his shovel to the shed.

Lester gently lets the blinds drop back into place. He glances down at the floor by the door to see if there's any trace of Dmitri's bootprints on the carpet, but the wet patch from the snow he dropped there earlier has already dried up. With any luck, Malvo won't know that Lester's had somebody over.

He picks up Dmitri's empty cup and washes it in the kitchen sink. Then, taking one last glance to make sure nothing is out of place, retreats back into the bedroom. He should take his ciprofloxacin and maybe some cold medicine—anything, really, that could sedate him for a while. He doesn't want to watch the news and he doesn't want to sit around all day thinking about his brother. He'd much rather use this time to rest.

There's a couple of boxes of _Theraflu_ in the en suite's medicine cabinet, the kind that comes as a powder. It's always managed to make him pretty drowsy in the past, so he grabs the box that's already been opened and reaches inside.

There are no pouches in it though. Instead, three small pill bottles have been stuffed inside. One reads _Adderall_ , and another _Triazolam_. The third's label has been completely torn off.

None of them have been prescribed to anyone.

Lester's willing to bet anything that these belong to Malvo, although he doesn't understand why the man would need them. _Adderall_ , he knows, is typically used to help children with ADHD. Back when Gordo began showing signs of withdrawal from social activity and a overall lack of interest in his classes, Chaz and Kitty had taken him to see a child psychiatrist who had immediately (and perhaps too enthusiastically) prescribed him the drug. That whole ordeal was quietly put to rest once his grades began to pick up again, of course, although Gordo continued to be socially awkward. Now it appeared as though autism was their next best bet for the poor kid's problems.

Lester remembers Kitty once telling him that the drug contained amphetamine, which is why she had been so relieved when Gordo had finally been taken off the prescription. It's no wonder then why Malvo has it hidden away, although Lester doesn't think the man's holding onto it for himself. Malvo's about the farthest thing from a junky Lester could possibly imagine.

 _Triazolam,_ on the other hand...well, he has no idea what _Triazolam_ is, and there's no way of him ever knowing what the third bottle contains. It could be mints for all he knows.

Whatever Malvo plans on doing with these, Lester knows that it's no business of his. He probably wasn't supposed to find the bottles anyway, so he tucks them back inside the box and replaces it in the shelf. He'll have to do without the cold medicine today.

Not knowing why those drugs are there still bothers him though. He can't be sure, but he feels as though he's heard about _Triazolam_ before, possibly years ago. It was in the news, definitely, although he figures it's probably just another stimulant.

He grabs his own bottle of ciprofloxacin and takes his first pill of the day, pausing for a moment to memorize the number printed on the underside of the cap. He's not sure what's going to happen to him tomorrow, but he's already decided that the first person he's going to call will be this women. If there's even the slimmest chance that she hates Malvo as much as he does, he'll happily take that risk.

Standing in front of the bathroom sink, he turns on the water until it's warm and then sticks the cap under the flow. Using his finger nail, he spends the next ten minutes or so scraping off the neon pink letters and numbers. He can't afford to have Malvo find this, regardless of the fact that he hasn't called the woman yet.

He towel dries the lid and replaces it on the bottle before dropping it back inside his prescription bag. Then he sets it to one side beside the tap and opens the bathroom door.

It takes him a second, but eventually he realizes that Lorne Malvo is sitting at the foot of the bed.

And, as always, the man is smiling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: So, I'm incredibly sorry about the delay. Again, let me know if there are any mistakes. I've read and reread this chapter so many times, I don't think I'd be able to catch another error unless it jumped off the page and slapped me in the face.
> 
> PS: I love Dmitri. He struck me as the sweetest and most innocent characters in the show...*sighs heavily*
> 
> PPS: "Jerry Lundegaard" is Lester Nygaard's parallel character from the Fargo film, hence his alias in this chapter.


End file.
